Prison Days And Nights

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VICTOm W. MMLSOM'

PRISON DAYS

GARDEN CITY PUBLISHING CO., INC.
GARDEN OTY NEW YORK

1936

GARDEN CITY PUBLISHING CO., INC.

Copyright, 1952 , 1933

BY LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY

All rights reserved

PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

CONTENTS

Introdticing the Prisoner ....

•

vii

I • Prison Days ....

•

3

II • Remembered Conversations

17

III • Reforming the Criminal

-

42

IM ' The Prisoner and Reformation

•

73

V • Prison Ethics and Etiquette

•

VI • ''Men Without Women^^ . . . .

.

140

VII • Drugs and the Criminal ....

.

T70

VIII Prison Nights

190

IX • More Remembered Conversations on

Crime ^

Punishment and the Prison

198

X • Prison Stupor

.

219

XI • The Freedom of the Convalescent

.

243

XII • The Prisoner Speaks to the Psychiatrist

271

V

Introducing the Prisoner

I HAD been looking for the articulate prisoner for
ten years when I met Victor Nelson.

The men in the jails are like the common men
everywhere. Their experience may sink deeply into
their hearts and minds, but they leave them inarticu-
late. They may live in a swirling and seething sea of
emotion, but they cannot shuffle around the twenty-
six magic symbols of speech, so as to portray their
inner storm. Or they may find some quaint phrase, or
some racy words which make up the concentrated es-
sence of their living mood, but these are scattered
moments of eloquence and quickly disappear in the
hours, days, and years of futile hatred and mute in-
adequacy.

Now and then one meets a quick and intelligent
mind in the jails, some man who has fallen into the
net of the law by some one mischance or through the
slipshod weakness of his make-up. Such men have
written of prison life, but their words are too deeply
personal to be of real value. Their experiences with
the society which has sequestered them by prison bars
and bolts have heated them into a passionate and ar-
dent eloquence, which has imprisoned their intellect.
They cannot see the woods because they have hurt
themselves against the trees. Their words burn, but

vii

INTRODUCING THE PRISONER
the thick smoke of their emotion throws no light on
crime. They succeed in portraying a criminal but not
criminality.

Nelson came into the little made-over cell in the
Norfolk County jail at Dedham, Massachusetts,
which is my office, the ordinary prisoner dressed in
the shapeless gray of the inmates, stood with arms
folded, according to the rule, and awaited my permis-
sion to sit down. I read his record, noting with grim
cynicism its length, its monotonous repetition of the
same oflFenses, and the long list of prisons and jails
where his youth had been spent to the end of "retri-
bution for his crimes, the determent of others, and
for his own reform.”

The number of incarcerations, the length of time
served, I reflected, qualified him to speak as an expert
on prisons. The official record sent me by the Massa-
chusetts Department of Correction, briefly summa-
rized, reads as follows:

Victor Folke Nelson was born in the Province of
Malmo, Sweden, June 5, 1898, next to the oldest of four
children of Swedish parents. When he was three years old,
his family migrated to the United States, settling immedi-
ately in Campello, a suburb of Brockton, Massachusetts.
His father, who is a tailor by trade, has held a number of
good positions. Because of his excessive drinking, however,
he has lost most of these positions and at present is a valet.
In an interview concerning his son, Mr. Nelson stated:
“The outside world knows more about that boy than I do.
I have seen very little of him since he was a small boy, be-
cause he got into trouble when he was only fourteen years

INTRODUCING THE PRISONER

of age, and I have had little to do with him since. He was
paroled once to my home, but he didn’t stay long before
he went away and got into trouble. When he came out of
State Prison, we thought we’d see if we could help him,
and my youngest son had saved a little money, and he gave
him one hundred dollars and told him to use it, and to get
on his feet and see if he couldn’t behave himself. But what
did he do? He went into the Statler, hired an expensive
room, gave a dinner party to some people, and then went
off and didn’t pay the bill. My son had to settle for that;
and he did the same thing in New York. It was within
forty -eight hours after he had been out of jail that he com-
menced to do this. That boy is hopeless. I don’t know what
any one can do with him. I can’t have him around my
house, and the brothers and sisters can’t have him, and I
don’t know what’s going to become of him. I suppose, as
soon as he is out this time, he will do something more and
get locked up again, and it looks to me that that’s where
he is going to spend his life. I don’t see that there’s any
reason for it. You can’t blame the orphanage, because one
of his brothers was in the orphanage, and he behaved all
right. It’s just in him, and I don’t know why. He’s more
intelligent than the rest of them, and it seems a pity that
he couldn’t have used it to good advantage.”

Nelson’s childhood was marked by economic pressure
in his home, but his mother, who died when he was seven
years of age, was thrifty and a good home-maker, who
managed to make both ends meet so that the family had
the necessities of life. Upon his mother’s death Victor and
one brother were placed in a Swedish Lutheran Orphanage,
where he remained approximately six years. He attended
Grammar School, from which he graduated when thirteen
years of age and had been in High School about a year
when he was committed to Lyman. Because he was poorly

ix

INTRODUCING THE PRISONER
adjusted in the orphanage, due to the fact that he was ui-
tellectually superior to the other children, he continually
ran away. Finally he was sent to the Lyman School on
March 8, 1913, when he appeared in the Stoughton court
for being delinquent. Since his commitment to Lyman, his
life has been spent almost wholly in institutions.

NELSON’S CRIMINAL RECORD

March 8, 191}. Stoughton (Mass.). Delinquent.

Committed to Lyman School, Westboro (Mass.).
Transferred to Shirley (Mass.) Industrial School
for Boys, in March, 1914*

August II, 1916. New York City. Grand Larceny.
Discharged by grand jury.

January ii, 1919. General Court Martial Board U. S.
Navy. Absence from Station and duty after leave had
expired.

Sentenced to 18 months Naval Prison, Portsmouth
(N. H.). June 21, i9i9» restored to duty on one
year’s probation; Feb. 12, 1920, returned to Naval
Prison; released July 3, 1920, with dishonorable
discharge.

November 30, 1919. New York City. Grand Larceny.
Suspended sentence i year.

’October 19, 1920. Roxbury (Mass.). Robbery,
(arraigned) Grand Jury.

December 16, 1920. Suffolk Superior Court, Boston. As-
sault and Battery with dangerous weapon.

(sentenced) Filed.

December t6, 1920. SufFolk Superior Court, Boston. Rob-
bery.

&ntenced to 3-5 years State Prison, Massachusetts.

X

INTRODUCING THE PRISONER

(The preceding, in brackets, represents the legal
steps on one and the same case.)

November i6, ipai. Suffolk Superior Court, Boston. Es-
cape.

May II, 1921, escaped from Massachusetts State
Prison; September ii, 1921, returned and sentenced
by Court to I to I years State Prison, to be served
from and after original sentence. Paroled December
17, 1923, in custody of Thomas Mott Osborne, for
whom he worked as librarian and literary assistant.
January 27, 1924. Auburn (N. Y.). Robbery, ist degree,
(arraigned).

Continued to February i, 1924.

May 20, 1924. Auburn (N. Y.). Robbery and Assault.
Sentenced to 3 years Auburn State Prison; released
June 29, 1927, and returned to Massachusetts au-
thorities. Transferred to Prison Camp and Hospital,
West Rutland (Mass.), October 8, 1930; released
at expiration of sentence, April 2 j, 193**

October 25, 1931. Quincy (Mass.). Drunkenness.

State Farm i year; paroled January 26, 1932.
October 25, 1931. Quincy (Mass.). Larceny.

Dismissed.

April 13, 1932. Norfolk (Mass.) Superior Court. Larceny.

Brought to Dedham, to serve 6 months’ sentence.
August 2, 1932. Paroled in charge of Doctor A. Myerson.

From March 8, 1913. at which date Nelson was com-
mitted to the Lyman School, until March 19149 when he
was transferred to the Industrial School for Boys, Shirley,
Massachusetts he ran away on four different occasions and
was paroled twice. In the institution he was considered a

XI

INTRODUCING THE PRISONER

bright boy and finished grade nine in school. His conduct
was fairly good other than his runaways. However, his
parole periods were unsatisfactory and he had to be re-
turned to the institution on the two different occasions he
was released on parole.

From October, 191^, until February, 1918, he served in
the Royal Flying Corps (British).

On May 13, 1918, Nelson enlisted in the Naval Reserve.
For the offense of staying off duty after leave had expired,
he was committed to the Naval Prison at Portsmouth on
January ii, 1919, from which he was restored to duty on
June 21, 1919, when he was given one year on probation.
On September 10, 1919, under a false name, he married.

After he appeared in court in New York City on No-
vember 30, 1919 for grand larceny, when he was given a
suspended sentence, Nelson was surrendered to the naval
authorities and returned to the Portsmouth Naval Prison,
from which he was finally released on July 3, 1920. At this
time he was given a dishonorable discharge from the navy.
Three months after his discharge from the navy, October
19, 1920, Nelson was arrested in Roxbury for armed rob-
bery. In the Suffolk Superior Court on December 16, 1920,
he was sentenced to serve three to five years at State Prison
on the same charge of robbery.

Nelson and a codefendant arranged to rob a manicurist
of a hotel by making a date with her and a friend. Late in
the evening the codefendant and his girl were to leave
Nelson and the victim so that the latter could carry out his
plans. The two girls were taken out to dinner by Nelson
and the other man on October 19, 1920. Later in the eve-
ning the manicurist invited them up to her room where
there was excessive drinking. When it was time to leave,
the other man invited the manicurist’s friend to go out to
xii

INTRODUCING THE PRISONER

eat, leaving Nelson and his victim alone. The former then
grabbed the manicurist, threw her on the bed and robbed
her of her jewelry. Her screams brought the landlady to
her room, whom Nelson also knocked down. In the mean-
time, one of the lodgers who heard the screams came to the
room and grappled with Nelson. However, Nelson over-
powered him, but as he was leaving the place, he was ar-
rested by a police officer who had been sent to the house.

After five months’ incarceration at the Massachusetts
State Prison, Nelson made a spectacular escape. On the
evening of May ii, 1921, as a group of inmates were being
taken from the guardroom to Cherry Hill under guard.
Nelson stepped out of line, climbed up a window by using
the bars as a stepladder and slid over the wall unharmed,
despite the bullets fired by an excited guard. (In escaping
Nelson betrayed no trust. He simply took a desperate
chance and was lucky enough to make it.) Although a
concentrated search was made for him, he remained at
large until September ii, 1921. For the period of his escape,
he claims to have remained in Boston and gets pleasure out
of telling of playing baseball with the men on the Boston
Common, knowing that the officials were searching for
him. He then traveled over the country and &nally drifted
into a lecture hall in Cincinnati, Ohio, where Thomas Mott
Osborne was lecturing and showing movies on reform.
Nelson made himself known to Mr. Osborne, who in turn
prevailed upon him to surrender to the Massachusetts au-
thorities. On September ii, 1921, in company with the re-
former, Nelson returned to State Prison and on November
ij, 1921, in the Suffolk Superior Court, was given an ad-
ditional year and a half sentence for escape.

Almost immediately upon his return, pressure was
brought to bear by lliomas Mott Osborne for Nelson’s

xiii

INTRODUCING THE PRISONER

pardon, basing the petition on the grounds that he had
voluntarily returned to State Prison and that the act mer-
ited reward in the form of executive clemency. Mr. Os-
borne enlisted his sister, Mrs. James J. Storrow, and
Reverend P. R. Frothingham in Nelson’s behalf. However,
he was denied pardon, but on repeated requests and prom-
ises by Thomas Mott Osborne that he himself would em-
ploy and supervise Nelson, he was paroled on December 17,
1923. Until December 29 he lived in Boston, at which time
he left for Auburn, New York, to work for Mr. Osborne
as librarian. In the early part of 1924 Osborne went away
for a week-end which left Nelson to himself. He claims he
became lonesome so he left the house to go to a saloon.
Some one there made some slurring remarks about Os-
borne. Nelson’s account of the affair is somewhat as fol-
lows: Nelson, a stranger in the neighborhood, realized that
a fight in the saloon would place him under too great odds.
So he followed the man home, asked to go inside to speak
to him, and once inside, proceeded to take the man to task
for his false insinuations about Osborne. A fight followed
in which the interior of the provokee’s house was fairly de-
molished. Nelson managed to come out on top — for the
moment. But his antagonist was a political enemy of Os-
borne’s, knew Nelson was on parole, and the next morning
notified the police — giving a highly garbled and emi-
nently false account of the whole affair.

On May 20, 1924, Nelson was sentenced to serve five
years in the Auburn State Prison on the charge of robbery
and assault. While in the institution, he took several exten-
sion courses at Columbia University on writing and secre-
tarial correspondence. He had a good style of writing and
sold several of his articles on penological subjects, a few
translated and original short stories, etc. On June 29, 1927,
xiv

INTRODUCING THE PRISONER
after serving the Auburn term» Nelson was returned to the
Massachusetts authorities as a parole violator and on Octo-
ber 8, 1930, transferred to the Prison Camp and Hospital.
He was released at the expiration of his sentence on April

1931-

Upon the expiration of his sentence, investigation by
the Division of Examination of Prisoners discloses that
Nelson went to New York where a friend lived. He did
general work in the neighborhood and it was hoped he
would write. However, it was finally decided that he was
a failure when he failed to do satisfactory work. In order
to get him out of the neighborhood, his friend paid his way
back to Sweden. Nelson claims that upon entering that
country, his relatives refused to have anything to do with
him. Therefore, within a month. Nelson returned to the
United States and was given another chance to work by
his friend. He robbed his hostess’ house one afternoon,
while intoxicated. A few hours later, just as she had dis-
covered the robbery and was telephoning to the police,
Nelson returned, nearly sober, explained what had hap-
pened, and recovered the stolen articles. She refused to file
any charge against him, however, so he started for the
West, reached Santa Fe, where he remained for two weeks,
after wh^'^H he started back to New York. Returxung
again and then leaving for St. Louis, he came back to this
part of the country and became a drunken nuisance.

At about 9:00 P.M., on October 25, 1931, a doctor left
his car parked in front of a building in Randolph, Mass.
His bag, containing instnuxients valued at $222, was
stolen from the machine and was later found in the pos-
session of Nelson. When approached by the doctor and
asked where he obtained the bag. Nelson stated he owned
it. However, the doctor detained him until the arrival

XV

INTRODUCING THE PRISONER

of the police, who arrested him on the charge of drunken-
ness and larceny. On October 26 , 1931, he was committed
to the State Farm at Bridgewater for one year on the
charge of drunkenness from which he was released on
January 26, 1932. While he was incarcerated at the State
Farm, a capias was issued and when he was released from
this institution, he was arrested and sentenced on April 13,
1932, in the Norfolk Superior Court to serve six months
in the house of correction on the charge of larceny.

When you add up roughly the years from his four-
teenth birthday to his thirty-fourth, one finds that
Nelson spent twelve and a half years in correctional
institutions of one kind or another. There is evidence
enough that he suffered retribution for his crimes,
and let us piously hope that his punishment may have
deterred others, but obviously his own reform had not
taken place. But some notes in that record caught
my eye, — the words of other examiners, that the
prisoner Victor Folke Nelson had an “exceptional and
high grade mind”, that he could write well, that in his
years in prison he had acquired culture and learning.
Scholarship, I reflected, was a hardy plant which
might grow in any soil.

I saw before me a slender, but lithely built man,
with a face that instantly aroused kindly feeling.
There are fine men who have to overcome by their
deeds the first hostile impression created somehow by
the unfortunate arrangement of their features. These
are low-grade men whose smile, or whose accidental
and inconsequential facial play and gesture, give them

INTRODUCING THE PRISONER
an easy and tragic entrance into the hearts of others.
This man had clear blue eyes, mobile mouth, white
teeth that flashed in and out of view in speech and
smile, well-poised head. Were these symbols of the
genuineness which they presaged or were they mere
parts of a mask? In life one must hazard much on
flimsily based approval, and ten minutes after I met
Nelson, I had made a wager with my own critical self.

For I said to myself, "Here, I think, is intellect, not
mere lively, attractive intelligence and amiable per-
sonality. And intellect is too rare on this disordered
human scene to be wasted in a jail and warped out of
shape by stupid living.”

"Here,” I reflected, "in this man who has been a
thief and a drunkard, there may be that double gift
of the Gods, that objective detachment from the self
by which a man can see himself in the setting of his
environment without the distortion of self-love, self-
pity, or self-hatred, and the inborn powers of one who
loves words. Scientist and artist, and the man who has
suffered. . . . You, Nelson, may be the man I am
looking for.”

So I discarded as irrelevant and insulting the rou-
tine of a psychiatric approach to the mind of this
prisoner, a routine suitable enough for the examina-
tion of men who find "what is one-half of one-half”
a problem, or who become lost in an intellectual vacu-
ity when asked, "Why do we number this year 1932”;
but as futile against a subtle and surging intellect as it
would be to measure the mere depth of the Atlantic

xvii

INTRODUCING THE PRISONER
in order to understand the life that lurks and flashes
in fantastic forms in its ceaseless waters.

I said to him, psychiatrists have been looking
at the prisoners for a long time and have had our say
about him in books, learned journals and public plat-
forms. Have we had anything real to say? Do we
know them? For the time being, I shall not tell you
what I think. Suppose, however, that you write for
my colleagues and myself what the prisoner thinks of
us, how the prisoner sees the psychiatrist. Will you
do it?”

Would he? An eager mind sprang into action, and
at once we plunged into a discussion which bridged
the chasm dividing the man in prison from the man
clothed with rank and authority. When it ended, be-
cause the urgent duties of a physician called me else-
where, I took steps for the ways and means of the
task.

Prison officials are like all other men; they have
many selves, — the one that pertains to their job and
the others which link them to the many phases of their
common humanity. They expressed themselves as glad
to codperate in the plan I laid before them, and I am
happy to give them full credit for being better than
their word. It is the grim and standing joke in the jails
that the prisoners have nothing else but the "time”
they are serving, yet even that time needs freeing be-
fore an incarcerated man can write. They set him free
from the dull chores of jail life; they gave him access
to a typewriter and furnished him with paper, pen
xviii

INTRODUCING THE PRISONER
and ink. Simple enough things to do, one may say, and
yet some representative of the bureaucracy of law and
order might have obstructed the plan on the ground
of that invulnerable argument that it never had been
done before.

During the next week Nelson flashed in and out of
the interstices of my thoughts, and I noted that I had
to whip up my enthusiasm as the cold harsh facts of
experience jolted my expectations — a long record of
failures, friends betrayed and opportunities lost be-
fore this; planlessness; stupid, impulsive, criminal
conduct; the fatal alcoholic habit; an all too attrac-
tive personality, which gave too easy an access to a
type of woman whose sensuality poisoned construc-
tive effort; a shallow exhibitionism which bred an im-
patience with the solid virtues of thrift and honesty.
Against these, what did the man have that I should
throw away the time which a very busy career im-
periously demanded and hazard a reputation for
knowledge of human nature and insight into its
vagaries? A nice face, a fine flow of words — nothing
else. What about that solid courage which we call in-
dustry? Was he one of those shallow souls who spread
out all their goods on first meeting and have no stock
to keep on selling?

Nethertheless, my duties called me to the jail, and
so one morning I read the document which appears
in this book as "The Prisoner Speaks to the Psychia-
trist.” Nelson handed it to me when the guard
brought him to my room, with apologies and obvious

XIX

INTRODUCING THE PRISONER
trepidation. It delighted me, for it confirmed me in
my belief that we psychiatrists were not really reach-
ing the prisoner, and I maliciously anticipated reading
his devastating words to some future group of my
colleagues. But more than this, I knew that, in so far
as his ability was concerned, I had read my man
aright; that he had talent, was no mere expositor of
his own feehngs, but a man capable of a first-class
piece of work. There and then this book was born.

He wrote for the next few weeks with amazing
speed, adding chapter after chapter of his experiences
along the lines of my suggestions. Then one day he
asked me, with the air of one who struggles against
his own presumption, if I would aid him to get a pa-
role. Without that aid, he knew — so he said — that
the authorities would not even consider his petition.
. . . The summer was slipping by; he wanted so
much to plunge into the cold waters of the ocean; to
burn out the pallor of his skin by the hot rays of the
August sun, as he lay on some beach; and he wondered
if he still had a good forehand stroke at tennis. . . .
Turn, if you will, to Nelson’s chapter on "Freedom
of the Convalescent” and see what this request meant
to him in the moving terms of the yearnings of the
body and mind. Or, better still, make that effort
which in its results is the only link of human union,
— put yourself in his place.

I pondered. Then I said I would help, but a plan
must be made which would organize the outer world

XX

INTRODUCING THE PRISONER
for Tii m, so that when paroled he would not receive
its buffets but would find it friendly and ready to
help. Society, I told him, had reflexes of responses to a
man against which he might be helpless, and also his
friends: and a man had habits which fatally led to dis-
aster unless a new life setting was provided. "Be pa-
tient, Nelson, let us see what others say about your
writings; let us confirm my judgment by that of
those whose own success in life depends on how they
judge the writing of others.”

So I went to the publishers, under whose imprint
this book is presented, and I told Nelson’s story to two
of the heads of the firm. I asked them to read the ma-
terial and to give me their opinion. So over a hot sum-
mer’s week-end, while Nelson continued to write in a
county jail and I caught fish with some seasick com-
panions in a dory off the shore of staid Swampscott,
the publisher read the manuscript in a country town.

Early the next week, we met in his office. He was
enthusiastic, albeit with the guarded approval of the
business man. "Fascinating — important — well writ-
ten — but a bit too free in the use of those words
which Old Dame Grundy and her servants in high
places say are not fit and proper. A little toning down
in the raw places — a few polite synonyms for the
raw, direct, and better Anglo-Saxon words. Yes, we
will take the book.”

"Ah,” I said, emboldened by my success, "let me
use the quaint phrase of the business man and sell you

xxi

INTRODUCING THE PRISONER
qnAtlii»r idea. Let us speak of advance royalties^ not in
the terms of ordinary speech, but in a more important
light. Let us say that they stand for freedom, for a
shortening of that procession of endless days and
nights in which a man awaits the shifting of those
tragic bolts which hold him in a hated place. Let us
turn them into plunges into the ocean waters, while
et-ill the summer sun is hot, or translate them into the
satisfaction of the deep, bodily and spiritual needs of
a sensitive organism. What do you say, then, to ad-
vance royalties of so much and so much to Nelson?**

“Agreed,” said the publisher.

So the application for parole was made, and after a
slight resistance on the part of the authorities, made
— I am sure — as a gesture to uphold the sternness of
the law, it was granted. This day Nelson is a free man
and reads these words as we drive to the place where
he will live and write.

I have told him time and again that he has a career
ahead of him, a golden opportunity. I have said that
he cannot take refuge in those excuses which make
childhood culpable for manhood. I have not spared
his feelings, although I have respected his reticences.
... A man at thirty-four can no longer put o£F his
Hfe*s organization; it is time for adolescent reckless-
ness to pass on; it is becoming for the forebrain to rule
the lower parts. . . . All these and other facts he
knows even better than I do, for they have "en-
graved on his eyeballs*’, as the Arabian phrase has it,
by the pitiless reflection of prison days and ni^t^ by
xxu

INTRODUCING THE PRISONER
exual starvation, by prison stupor, by those lacks
vhich become tragic wounds.

The great experiment begins. Have I helped to free
i man who will add the products of his mind to the
(vorld, or will the prison reclaim its own?

Abraham Myerson, M.D.

• ••
XXIU

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS

chapter I

Prison Days

In the early morning my cell was always flooded
with light. When I most desired the sheltering gloom,
my sordid surroundings were glaringly revealed by
the realistic sun. Nearly always I would be awake
when the rising bell rang; and on most mornings I
would just lie there, warm, relaxed, still clinging
tightly to the dream world. For, like many prisoners,
I spent most of my conscious moments in a world of
fantasy which was far different from the grim world
of crass reality. At mornings I hated to let go of the
dream world, which was rich, complete, satisfying,
full of the night’s imaginings. It was almost unbear-
able to let it fade out and be obliged to face the gro-
tesque world of steel bars and stone walls: the world
of drabness and monotony now so starkly naked in the
cruel brilliance of early morning light. . . .

My cell measured six by eight feet wide and seven
feet high and was on the whole a most cramped and
discouraging place. An old deal table, a wooden chair,

3

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS

an aluminum washbasin, a venerable wooden slop
bucket; these, besides the narrow bed, were the
familiar objects upon which my unwilling eyes were
obliged to look each morning. ... So I would
usually just lie there with my eyes tightly closed and
my face to the dark side of the cell, consciously with-
holding myself from a return to reality, eagerly re-
living remembered fragments of the past, or imagined
scenes from a forthconiing, ecstatic future, hrmgrily
clasping to my heart each small bit of vicarious life.
All about me was living death: anemic bodies, starved
souls, hatred and misery: a world of wants and wishes,
hungers and lusts; a world of suffering men.

I would lie there remembering various feelings, ex-
periences, bits of verse:

** Yonder 5 see the morning blink!

The sun is up, and up must I:

To wash and dress, to eat and drink;

To look at things; to talk and think;

To work — and God knows why.

**Oh, often have I washed and dressed.

And what’s to show for all my pains?

Let me he abed and rest.

Ten thousand times Fve done my best.

And all’s to do again.” ^

Lying there, I might let fast-flying Memory carry
me back to other times, to earlier ways of living and
stages of development; to the day, for example, when

^A. E. Housman.

4

PRISON DAYS

I had first felt the terror of the trapped animal: the
gnawing, agonizing fears and despairs of the suddenly-
caged beast.

It was at the age of twelve that I first knew the
torture of captivity. I had run away from the orphan-
age for perhaps the seventh time. The matron, Miss
Garbelius, did not know just what to do about me.
I was her greatest problem. Small wonder that she
could not cope with it, when it is a problem with
which, even to-day, I find myself all but incapable of
coping. Miss Garbelius had tried simply everything
with me. She had tried threatening me, scolding me,
praying with me, praying for me, having the Lutheran
minister talk with me; she had tried whipping me her-
self with a hard leather strap, and later had had me
whipped by a muscular hired man with an even harder
strap. She had tried, poor woman, everything in
heaven and on earth which seemed likely to "save”
me, and each method of punishment seemed equally
futile. Each method was equally futile. But this was
a lesson Miss Garbelius never learned. ... So she now
tried locking me in a clothes closet. It was lonely and
quiet and utterly dark in the closet. I hated it. Miss
Garbelius herself would bring me my meals three times
a day, and with them sermons and admonitions and
threats and intended inducements to good behavior.
Also, by way of dessert, she would bring me prophecies
of the eternal damnation which was sure to overtake
me if I did not mend my ways. In brief, she tried
everything on earth which might serve to make me

5

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
alter my \morthodox and unaccountable ways. The
method which seemed to her most promising at the
moment was to lock me into the clothes closet for
several days. Each night, however, when the other
children were asleep in their chaste white beds, Miss
Garbelius’s essential humanity would assert itself, and
she would come sneaking to my small prison — sneak-
ing is really the word; she would have been so utterly
discomfited and nonplussed had any one seen her —
and let me out. *'Go to your bed,” she would say. And
in the morning, before any one would be up who
might witness her weakness and humanity, she would
awaken and recommit me to the dark little
prison. . . .

During the minutes before my oriented eyes could
pierce the blackness, it was pretty horrible. My ter-
rified imagination would fill the dark places with
slimy figures whose eyes and lusts threatened me. I
would see the unmitigatedly viciom and implacable
“jabberwock,” to dream of which was the most stun-
ning horror. His menacing, pointed, death-delivering
tail would hammer upon the closet door, while his
hideous toothy jaws slavered at me through the key-
hole. With his baleful, gleaming eyes and thick, red
tongue, with the drooling spittle which always pro-
claimed his unappeasable appetite and inordinate lusts,
he was surely the foulest beast which in those days
crawled the earth.

But soon the darkness would grow less gloomy. Not
that I could see anything very clearly. The only light
6

PRISON DAYS

came through the keyhole. But at least there was a
lightening of the unbearable blackness.

On the second day of my captivity, I found un-
expected, delightful entertainment. Sitting that after-
noon in listless misery, idly playing with a pair of old
shoes, I chanced to observe that the slanting rays of
the afternoon sun came through the keyhole and
threw a most fascinating picture on the opposite wall.
Naturally it was a very dim and shadowy picture;
nevertheless a picture — a fascinating, exciting thing
to see under the conditions. To me, at the time, it
seemed an absolute miracle. I knew nothing about the
laws of optics and refraction. I would sit there looking
at it for hours, perfectly contented, until the shadows
had become too long and the picture slowly faded
out. It offered so many possibilities; I would, I
thought, get some of the other children to come to the
bedroom and perform little dramas which, in perfect
miniature, I would behold in dim perfection from my
closet box. The closet was thus robbed of most of its
terrors through sheer accident. The tormenting fact
remained, of course, that by no effort of will or
strength or desire could I get the closet door open.
The sense of captivity was the essential heartquake of
it. I was a helpless prisoner. My roving imagination
betrayed me. It worked accursedly in the interests of
law and order, of custom and convention. I would
reflect; Suppose the place caught fire and no one hap-
pened to think of me! Suppose I fainted away and
died before any one found me! I thought of all those

7

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
agonizing things which a fertile imagination can
create for the chastisement of the human spirit. The
saving grace of the situation was that I had a pro-
tecting shield of darkness behind which I could hide
my fears and trepidations. . . .

Or, lying in the prison cell, waiting for the moment
to come when I must get up, I would think of the first
night I had spent in a real cell. After all, the first cell
was merely a clothes <;loset. Again I had run away
from the orphanage. Again Miss Garbelius — poor,
kind, stupid, right-wanting woman — did not know
what to do about me. My wanderlust was a thing
which must be subdued, stamped out entirely. How
could she think otherwise? Had she not been brought
up on the Christian (Lutheran) Bible? Did not the
Bible say that the way of the transgressor must be
made hard?

Miss Garbelius now enlisted the help of certain en-
forcers of law and order: a judge, a sheriff, a detective,
and sundry other persons. The plan was to frighten
me. The old theological plan. I was to be so thor-
oughly fear-smitten that never again would I dream
of running away, nor dare to be anything except a
model boy. That was the plan. But "man proposes.”
This is the way it worked out. . . . They brought me
to a near-by county jail and summarily clapped me
into a cell — "clapped” is in this case the God-given
word. The keeper fairly shook the earth as he slammed
the steel door on me. (He had, of course, been told to
do so.) The effect of it upon my juvenile nerves is all
8

PRISON DAYS

but indescribable. As nearly as I can put it into words,
it was startling, unexpected, shocking: like an un-
looked-for clap of mighty thunder on a clear night. I
was thoroughly frightened.

As I lay on my bed in the prison cell, reliving these
old days, one fact impressed me unequivocally. I
thought of the sheer futility of the methods of punish-
ment which had been tried on me. I could with perfect
truth say that everything except hanging had been
tried on me — with no more beneficent effect than if
I had never been punished. Those who had power over
me had tried every conceivable form of punishment
which they deemed compatible with human dignity
(their dignity, of course; not mine). Everything had
proved ineffective, futile, wasteful. . . . The impor-
tant thing is this. Punishment is supposed to have a
certain deterrent effect. They think to frighten the
human animal into obedience, or at any rate into a
semblance of it. Very well. Their methods of punish-
ment were very successful. That is to say — they
wanted to frighten me and they succeeded. I was
very thoroughly frightened. I was not only frightened
— I was convinced that they were right. They suc-
ceeded in convincing me that I was one of the villains
of this world, for whose sins no punishment could be
too harsh. Briefly they succeeded in every way in
which the proponents of punishment as a method of
"reform” could hope to succeed. And what was the
measure of their success?

I kept on doing the same things I had been doing.

9

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS

Is it any wonder, then, that I question the “deter-
rent” effects of punishment? Everything I have seen
and felt and thought about it tells me that the “deter-
rent” effect of punishment is merely another pious
platitude.

In this connection, I would remember a book I had
just been reading. (Thomas Mott Osborne’s “Society
and Prisons.”) In this book, discussing the various
ways of controlling the human “maverick,” Osborne
quotes Doctor Johnson. Somebody had made a speech
in the House i« which it was maintained that severity
is not the way to govern vmruly boys. The inquisitive
Boswell repeated this statement to Doctor Johnson.
Doctor Johnson said: "Nay, it is the way to govern
them. I know not whether it be the way to mend
them.” From a tolerable amount of experience with
this phase of life upon the earth, I can give a hearty
assent to Doctor Johnson’s skepticism. Severity is
surely not the way to mend the nonconforming human
animal. It is, on the other hand, the way to make him
even more anti-social. . . .

I would lie there in bed, my face to the dark side of
the cell, chnging tightly to old times and to future
times; to anything which promised even a vicarioiu
life. The contiguous, encircling reaUty was too harsl
to be borne.

At last I would have to get up. Breakfast. Mush am
milk. Beans. Whatever it happened to be. It was nevei
any good. How could it be? It was merely fuel. I
life-preserving commodity. It was naturally not goo(

lO

PRISON DAYS

nor appetizing food. If it had been interesting, well-
flavored food, each of the guards could have said in
his heart, "Why should these men eat better food
than I can get at home?” Like us, the guards were also
the victims of social and financial inequalities.

Breakfast. . . . "To wash and dress; to eat and
drink; oh, often have I washed and dressed, and what’s
to show for all my pains?” . . . The futility, the
monotony, the drabness of it. Every day the same
feelings, the same food, the same sense of stultification.
The jaded prisoner would say to himself: "Jesus
Christ! the same to-day, to-morrow, and forever-
more.” . . . Will there always be drabness? Will there
never be life} And how look for life in a tomb.

Eight o’clock. The Bucket Brigade, the march of
Feces and Urine. Walking down the yard with the
bucket on cold winter days was not bad. There was
the sense of escape from the nightly horror of the
cell, the feeling that a new day had begun, and that
"each day is a day nearer home,” home meaning noth-
ing so much as freedom, whether or not one had a
home to go to. . . . But in the hot summer months,
when the nausealbig odors assailed one, full of a
presage of disease and death, it was not so good. One
walked to the brink of the walled-in cesspool, gagging
and choking at the redoubled onslaught of stenches,
emptied the bucket, threw in a scoopful of disinfec-
tant, hung the bucket on a nail, and marched back
into the shop line. . . . One might stand there think-
ing about nothing in particular; drugged by the prev-

II

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
alent "prison stupor”; or one might stand there
thinking about other lines and columns of uniformed
men in which one had previously stood. The basic feel-
ing was one of waiting — waiting for the new day
actually to begin; for the day of working, of looking
for mail, of waiting for news about one’s "case,” for
word about parole, pardon, or whatnot.

In straggling, disorderly ranks we would march to
the shops: the shoe shop, the print shop, the plate
shop: whatever shop it might happen to be. . . .
Some of us might wonder about the values involved.
What about trades? Who the hell wants to be a shoe-
maker when he gets out? Where can you find a job
making automobile plates in the free world, when
they’re all made in prison? This business of classifica-
tion and segregation; they make us sleep in separate
cell blocks, according to the provisions of some scheme
they have in mind; but during the day, we’re all
thrown together in the shop. . . . Classification
versus profit-making! In a country whose predomi-
nant codes are personal aggrandizement and private
enrichment — what would the answer be?

I sit down at my machine in the tailor shop. I have
never done any of this work before. I am naturally
inept, having no mechanical skill whatever. "Paddy”
comes along. He is the instructor. An Irishman. “Ah,”
he said, “ye’re wan of me own kind.” And throws a
pile of work in front of me. Pants, overalls, shirts,
whatnot. He tries to tell me a funny and obscene
story. I don’t feel like listening to it. I do not like him,

12

PRISON DAYS

knowing him to be a convict-hater at heart. My mind
is on other things: grave things: the implications of
imprisonment. "Listen,” I say, "you get to hell out of
here, Paddy. If you have anything to say to me about
the work, all right, say it. But the judge didn’t say
that I had to sit here and listen to your bum jokes.
That wasn’t in the sentence at all.” Paddy very
naturally resents my attitude, as I resent his. He feels,
too, that in some way I am his superior. I have a cer-
tain intellectual dominance over him. He hates that,
as I hate his brute power over me (if I do not complete
my daily task, Paddy can have me sent to solitary con-
finement as a malingerer) . . . . It is a Mexican stand-
off. He would like to punish me — not because he
cares very much about the work itself, but because
he hates a certain overt and unconcealed superiority
which I have taken great delight in making him aware
of. That is my revenge. But since I’ve actually kept
myself apparently busy all day, although I have not
completed the task, Paddy is powerless to punish me.
That is, he cannot send me to the "block.” He can,
however, and does punish me in more effective ways.
Whether or not I complete my task for the day,
Paddy each morning throws a fresh bundle of work
on my bench. This means that I shall never be caught
up; that I shall never have a moment of leisure. Other
men can complete their task during the morning and
loaf the rest of the day. I simply have not the me-
chanical skill to cope with the daily task. Paddy, there-
fore, wins. In spite of what I feel is my superiority, I

13

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
cannot score off Paddy. He is brute stupidity rampant
and successful. He is prison work. . . .

It is noontime. The hateful shop morning is ended.
We march to our cells for the noon meal and an hour
of rest. Rest!

How rest the tired, rebellious, imprisoned mind?

One cannot rest. One can merely escape from the
existing drabness. One can merely lie down on the bed
and drift off into the dream world; into memories of
the past, visions of the future; neither of which is
satisfactory except in retrospect or anticipation. One
lies in a stupor, shutting out the undignified, unap-
petizing dullness; deliberately or unconsciously run-
ning away from life. This is a bad habit to get into,
this flying from reality; but it is a habit into which
practically all of us get, mildly or terribly, depending
entirely on the length of our sentences, our ages, our
intensities of awareness.

One o’clock. Back to work again. The same stuffy
shops, the same tiresome work. It is absolute industrial
masturbation! Merely working men in order to keep
them busy, with no pride in the finished product, no
care about inculcating habits of craftsmanship, no
thought except to make us do something we don’t
like to do. The guards on their elevated benches be-
come lazy-minded, unpremeditated sadists, and take
a senseless delight in giving each man the job he most
heartily hates to do. This comes from natural stupid-
ity, prejudices racial and religious, and the fierce de-
sire of the average man to savor power — when he

14

PRISON DAYS

gets a chance to use it. Lo, the poor guard! In his
mind’s eye he can see us as we were in the free world;
with money, ravishing women, all the sensual delights
which must be forever unattainable to him. We have
had this. He has never had it, never will have it.
Therefore, enviously, gloatingly, he exacts vengeance
upon us for the unalterable deficiencies in his own life.

Work, work, work; day in and day out; hateful,
stupefying work, to which we bring nothing but
resentment and from which we take nothing but
hatred. Thus we spend eight hours each day — one
third of our lives. We read the prison books: Tully,
Lowry, Maynard, Booth, John Boyle O’Reilly, Jack
London, Ed Morrell, Al Jennings; but especially Jim
Tully. . . . One finds in them nothing but excite-
ment, glamour, danger, brilliance. (Tasker’s “Grim-
haven,” however, is a fine piece of work.) Well, not
nothing but excitement; but at any rate chiefly ex-
citement. We know that nothing could be further
from the truth. Day after day we find that prosyness,
inertia, stolidity, weariness and dejection are the pre-
vailing qualities of our lives. The escapes and murders
— the exciting things — are so infrequent as to be
practically nonexistent. . . . Every minute of the
day, all the year round, the most dominant tone is one
of monotony.

Four o’clock. Yard time. Recreation. ... We go
from the stuffy shop to the colorless yard. In it is no
blade of grass, no tree, no bit of freshness or brilliance.
Gray walls, dusty gravel, dirt and asphalt hardness.

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
We walk about, or during our first few months or
years manage to throw a ball back and forth and in
some degree exercise our bodies. The longer we stay
here, the less we do. At last we merely walk at a
funeral pace, or lean against a wall and talk.

We always talk. During the working hours, but
even more so during the cell hours, we store up facts,
reflections, broodings, so that our minds are overflow-
ing. And every chance we get to unburden them, we
avail ourselves of it. We talk at each other. We do
not converse; we deliver monologues in which we get
rid of the stored-up bubblings. We try to live through
words and self-dramatization. Our essential need is
for actual tangible living, which we cannot have; so
we try to live by pretending to live in tall stories based
on how we’d like to live, how we long to live. . . .

Four-thirty. Yard time is over. We march to our
cells, taking with us the evening meal. The shop has
been so enervating, so weakening, so downright de-
vitalizing, that we are glad to go to our cells. We
think, "Well, here’s another day done. Another day
nearer home. God, but it’s good to get back to the
cell!’’ In our hearts, however, we know that the cell is
even worse than the shop; and that in the morning
we’ll be saying, "God, but it’s good to get out of that
damned cell!”

i6

Chapter II

Remembered Conversations

XHE student of human behavior, as he looks at the
prisoner in the cell, is likely to ask himself: What is in
that man’s mind? What does he think about the crime
he committed? Is he contrite and penitent? Is he
merely sorry he was caught? Or is he full of anger and
resentment against the forces of law and order and
the whole social environment? What is his attitude
toward crime, toward the policeman, toward the
judge, the jury, the district attorney, and toward the
whole subject of crime and punishment? Is he a man
given to reflection and self-analysis? If so, what does
he think about his own conduct, and about the cir-
cumstances and events which have influenced his own
life?

The average criminal may be an ignorant, con-
ceited, selfish person; he may be so dangerous to the
welfare of the community that it is necessary for a
time, to keep him in prison. The criminal, from a
scientific point of view, like many persons in the free

17

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
world, is a maladjusted individual. I have no illusions
about him; but, on the other hand, I have learned that
he is, like the rest of us, a human being who can be-
have only according to his intelligence, education, and
general attitude toward life. Since his attitude toward
life clearly reveals why he is in prison, I am willing
to record it truthfully, for only then will it be of
value to the penologist.

Generalities about the convict are no safer to make
than generalities about the cornet player, the prosti-
tute, the doctor, or any other class or group. A few
general statements, however, are not only safe to
make, but quite necessary to a discussion of the
thoughts and attitudes of the convict.

It may be pointed out that since the convict is es-
sentially the man whose life has been more or less
warped and ruined, his thoughts and attitudes are
greatly clouded by self-pity and wishful thinking.

An important factor in the creation of thought and
attitude among convicts is the fact that there are in
the prison world certain individuals who — because
of former social, political or financial prominence;
because of reputations acquired through newspaper
notoriety during their careers and trials; because of
intramural prominence gained through escapes, the
holding of good prison jobs, or natural superiority in
the form of physical or intellectual prowess — form
what may be called a prison aristocracy, or upper class.
Such individuals, regardless of their natural intelli-
gence, education, or other claims to intellectual superi-

i8

REMEMBERED CONVERSATIONS
ority, come to be regarded by their less highly endowed
fellow convicts as oracles. Their thoughts and atti-
tudes are as sedulously aped by the convicts of lower
degree as those of Ford or Doctor Cadman or Hoover
are aped by the citizens of lesser degree in the free
world.

Moreover, the convict, like the free citizen, tends
to choose his friends from among the persons whose
tastes and prejudices most nearly agree with his own.
Since, from the nature of his surroundings, the con-
vict has extremely few chances of meeting persons
whose tastes and opinions differ from and might
stimulate his own, he tends more and more to associate
exclusively with those of the same caliber, and thus
gets into an intellectual rut out of which he rarely
escapes.

The average convict is, like the average free man,
intolerant of ideas and opinions which differ too much
from his own. His conversation, therefore, is not the
free discussion of ideas which may be had only among
intelligent persons; it consists chiefly in loud and re-
peated assertions of whatever he happens to think or
believe.

Thus, herd thought and opinion within the prison
greatly influence the thought and opinion of the in-
dividual convict. In any community, orthodoxy is the
price of peaceful living. In the prison community
there are certain orthodoxies of belief which, how-
ever heterodox they may appear to the law-abiding
■citizen, form the chief tenets of convict opinion. It is

19

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
well for the individual prisoner to keep within the
limits of this orthodoxy, or at least to keep his hetero-
dox opinions to himself. It pays to run with the herd,
if peace is the goal. It so happens that one of the
tenets of convict orthodoxy is that a convict must
never give any information to a prison official or to
the public. If, for example, some convict believes that
an expression of his ideas about crime and punishment
might be of value to society he will be sure to arouse
the anger and resentment of the prison herd, unless
his writings consist chiefly in denunciations of un-
pleasant conditions. This will always meet with the
approval of the herd. To the extent that he truthfully
exposes the facts about crime and the criminal, he can
expect to be ostracized and generally considered a
traitor to his kind. The natural reaction of the herd
is, *‘\7ho the hell does he think he is? Does he think
he’s any better than the rest of us?”

This thralldom to orthodoxy is far more stringent
in the prison world than in the free community and
has far more disastrous effects. The man who in the
free world arouses the ire of his neighbors by expres-
sions of radical opinion can always move on to a more
congenial environment, whereas the prison radical
must stay where he is, for years or it may be for life,
and face the hostility of his fellow convicts. This
tends to discourage the individual prisoner who is
capable of rising above the intellectual level of the
prison herd.

One last word. Since the opinions and attitudes of
20

REMEMBERED CONVERSATIONS
rapers, murderers and one-crime prisoners in general
are largely those of the average law-abiding citizen,
they need not be repeated here. The attitudes and
opinions which chiefly concern us now are those of the
professional criminal. These I shall record as accu-
rately and truthfully as I can. If the remembered con-
versations here recorded seem unduly besprinkled with
foul language, I must ask the reader’s indulgence.
This is the habitual language of the convict, which I
did not devise and do not hope to change. Undistin-
guished though these conversations may be for origi-
nality of thought or brilliance of expression, they are
replete with fervent sincerity, and often with fiery-
eyed fanaticism. At any rate, here they are.

On Judges, Courts, District Attorneys and

Such

Says a convict: "What a swell son of a that

Judge So-and-So must be. Did you see yesterday’s
American} Well, here’s what he done. It seems some
farmhand is driving along the road in a tip cart. He
sees a young kid about eight years old — a girl —
playing out in a field. So he climbs out of his cart, the
dirty bastard, and drags this little girl out into the
bushes and rapes her. Only eight years old, she was,
mind you. So what does this Judge So-and-So do? He
gives this farmhand a spiel about how this kind of
stuff has got to be stopped, and how he’s going to
make an example of this guy. And what does he give

21

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
him but a lousy six monfhsl Can you tie that? And
here I am doing ten to fifteen years, and all I done was
bust into a lousy drug store. But listen to this. Here’s
the beauty part. The very next guy that comes up
before So-and-So is a guy that grabbed a hot car, a
Buick or something. And what do you think So-and-
So does to him? He hands him five yearsl Now do you
mean to tell me that Judge ain’t crazy? Why, the
dirty slob must be crazy. Either that, or he’s a rape
fiend in his heart. How else can you figure it?”

“Yeah,” says another, “he’s as crazy as a bedbug.
There’s no doubt about it. But look at this here, now,
Mancuso, or what’s his name, in New York. I see
where they’ve got him in the satchel for fixing cases
and grabbing a bunch of cash. I always knew he’d
grab a hot stove if he thought he could get away with
it. Hell, they’re all a lot of grafters. They’re even
worse than we are. At least, we don’t make out we’re
any better than anybody else, and we don’t get paid
for upholding the laws, like those guys. And the stink-
ing bastards send the likes of me and you to prison
while they’re out there grabbing off more dough than
we’ll ever see in our lives!”

“Well, what of it?” says a third. “Wouldn’t you
rather have ’em like that? Didn’t you ever kick in
with a few bucks to save yovurself from going to the
can [prison] ? If those guys were honest, you and me’d
be spending all our time in places like this. Good luck
to ’em, I say. Let ’em grab all they can get. It’s all o.k.
with me. Society? Damn society! What did society

2Z

REMEMBERED CONVERSATIONS
ever do for me? Any time I get pinched, and there’s a
crooked cop, or district attorney, or judge that will
put me on the street for a few bucks, believe me, I’m
tickled to death to kick in with it.”

“That’s all right,” says a fourth. “If it only costs
a few bucks to square up a case, I wouldn’t mind. But
Jesus Christ! Those guys don’t talk any numbers that
I can get my dukes on; all they talk is box-car num-
bers. Nobody but A1 Capone, or some of those guys,
can afford to kick in with that kind of dough. And
then, somebody’s got to go to prison, or those judges
couldn’t hold down their jobs. And we’re the poor
slobs that hit the big house — you and me are the
suckers.”

“Yeah,” says Number Five. “They’re all out for the
old do-ray-me. Steal a million and you’ll never hit the
can. But get a pinch when you haven’t got fall
money, and have to take one of them cop-a-plea
lawyers the court hands you, and where do you get
off? Look at me, with a sawbuck to do, and them Page
and Shaw swindlers (they had plenty of dough) get
off with a lousy couple of years down the Island. Guys
like that get away with murder; and the same judge
that gave them the deuce handed young Sobrowski
thirty-five to forty! And the chump kid’s only nine-
teen years old. He’ll be a lot of good to anybody by
the time he’s packed that bit away!”

“And what the hell do they know about prisons,
anyhow?” asks Number Six. “Most of ’em never even
saw the inside of one. They don’t even know what

23

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
one looks like, let alone what it feels like to pack away
five or ten years in the can. They ought to make every
one of the lousy crumbs do a six-month bit before
they go on the bench. Then maybe they wouldn’t be
so goddam free with the years they hand out. And the
likes of those guys — guys like this So-and-So, and
district attorneys like Tufts and Pelletier, and cops
like this Garrett, and all those guys — they’re sup-
posed to be guys for us to look up to and copy! Every
other one of the bastards is a cheap grafter. And then
they expect the likes of us to be honest!”

"Sure,” says Number Eight. "It’s the same every-
where. Look at the prison officials, especially the
guards. They’re mostly a lot of bums that happened
to have a friend with a little political pull. Most of
them never had any education or anything. If they
had to go out and earn their living, they’d starve to
death, unless they happened to find jobs cleaning
cuspidors, or something like that. Take that big stiff
of a Gledron that was on in my wing last night. A
couple of guys happened to be talking after lights out.
Now you wouldn’t mind if he’d go down there and
tell them in a half -civilized way to stop the racket.
But what does he do? He goes down there and don’t
even know who was making the noise. He just stops
at the first cell he happens to think is near it and
starts to bark and snarl at some guy that was minding
his own business. And when the guy tries to tell him
that he wasn’t talking, So-and-So yells at him, 'Don’t
shoot off your mouth to me, or I’ll run you down to

24

REMEMBERED CONVERSATIONS
the cooler and let you try some bread and water!’ The
dirty, lousy little bastard. He goes down there and
gets tough with a guy he wouldn’t even dare to look
at if he was outside, where the guy had an even chance
with him. He acts like a tough guy, in here, and he
knows goddam well that almost any man in the place
could knock his ears off in a fair fight. I hate a guy like
that. Guys like him — and there are plenty of them
here — know that they’re only a lot of tripe. They
know we had more dough, and everything else, when
we were out, than they’ll ever have, and it burns them
up ; and they take out their spite on any poor slob that
happens to get into a little jam in here.”

"You said it, pal,” says Number Nine. “They’re a
pretty low-down lot. I don’t say they’re all like that.
Take Hannon, and Old Man Donovan, and guys like
that; they’re pretty square shooters, and give a guy a
break. But how many guys like them are there? From
the warden down, chaplains and all, they’re a pretty
lousy outfit. All they care about is if the count is
right and to have no riots; outside of that, we could
all rot to death, and they wouldn’t give a fiddler’s
so-and-so for us. And the line of crap they hand out
to the papers and the women’s clubs. 'We try to use
our men right over here at Charlestown,’ and all that
kind of stuff. When, as a matter of fact, they don’t
do a goddam thing for us except let us have three
half-arse meals a day and a cell to sleep in at night.
And they think that’ll reform a guy. Don’t that give
you a pain in the neck?”

^5

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS

**Sure does,” says Number Ten. "Still and all, I
s’pose they’s got to be laws and judges, and like that.
Christ, if they wasn’t any, think what would happen.
Everybody’d be runnin’ around stealin’, rapin’ and
killin’ everybody else.”

"Says you,” says Number Twelve. "To hell with
laws and judges. I say let every man look after what
he’s got. I’d like to see anybody try to steal anything
off of me.”

"Huh!” says Number Eleven. "I’d like to see you
get clipped for something. You’d put up such a
screech that they’d hear you way out in Australia!
There’s nobody that can holler as loud as a thief that’s
been beat for something.”

"Sure, you’ve got to have laws,” says Number
Twelve. "But not these kind of laws. Why don’t they
make ’em right? And why don’t they go just as much
for one man as for another? Take it when one guy
comes up before one judge and gets six months, while
another guy comes up before another judge and gets
six years, and they’re both convicted of the very same
crime. Or take it in the South, or lots of places. They’s
a lot of young broads running around wild, aching to
get stayed with. They’ve been there before and want
to be there again. Suppose you or me come along and
meet up with one of them broads. It doesn’t matter if
she grabs right hold of you and begs you, it’s rape if
she happens to be under sixteen, or eighteen, or what-
ever the law says in that State. Do you call that right?
z6

REMEMBERED CONVERSATIONS
Not only that, but almost any broad that gets caught,
all she has to do to save her face is holler rape, and the
cops and juries always take her word for it. Take
these here four coons from wheresis. They want to get
off the squash, so they fix it up with this white broad
to take on the whole four of them. She fixes them all
up and they pay her for it. Then, when her old man
hears about it, she hollers rape, and the four coons
wind up getting twenty to twenty-five years! Ain’t
that a swell come-off?”

"Yeh,” says Number Thirteen. “And look at all
these so-called business men — these bucket-shop guys
and stock swindlers and embezzlers. They swindle
widows and orphans and poor people out of their sav-
ings and insurance money — but did you ever hear
of one of them getting a bit like ours? Not on your
life. They get a lousy couple of years; and when they
come to prison, the warden and the screws fall all
over themselves giving them all the good jobs and all
the best breaks. In the first place, the laws don’t let a
judge give them the bits they can give us. No. The
laws were made by lawyers and business men and
bankers and the like of that. I think they’re the lousiest
bastards in the world. I may be a thief and all that;
but, by Christ, I wouldn’t steal my money from a
widow or an orphan, or from poor people. Next to
raping a young kid, I think theirs is the lousiest racket
in the world. Those guys do some real harm. They put
banks and whole communities on the bum, while all

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
we do is beat some guy for a few bucks that he can
easily afford to lose. And all they get is months, where
we get years.”

“And that wouldn’t be so bad,” says Number Four-
teen. "But when those guys and the rapers come up
for parole, they’re just the bastards that are turned
loose. The parole board doesn’t want to let us go. No.
We’re too dangerous. A regular thief hasn’t got a
chance when he goes up for parole — not in this
State. The thing isn’t a parole board, anyway. A board
is where three or four people discuss a case and then
take a vote on it. But here it’s all So-and-So, and
what he says goes. The rest of them are only figure-
heads ; they haven’t got any more to say about it than
I have or you have.”

“And where the hell,” says Number Seven, “does
this guy So-and-So get off at, to tell us how much time
we have to do? When a judge hands me twelve to
fifteen years, he knows that under the law I am
eligible for parole in eight years. He believes that I
shall serve only eight years; that’s why he gives me
that sentence. But what happens. If I am a thief,
instead of a raper or a swindler, So-and-So makes me
serve at least ten or twelve years, instead of eight;
and if he gets it in for me, he makes me serve the
whole goddam fifteen, if I’ve been locked up once for
a petty violation of prison rules (which is all he needs
as an excuse) . Now who the hell is So-and-So that he
should have all that power? They say he’s nothing but
a small-town guy who happened to be a neighbor of
28

REMEMBERED CONVERSATIONS
Cal Coolidge’s, or something. He used to have a little
express business, running trunks back and forth from
the hotels and theaters to the railroad station. Does
that make him the kind of a man who should have all
that power? In a pig’s neck! The proof of it is the
way he acts. He never lets a man out if he can help it;
that’s why the goddam prison is so crowded that
they’re sleeping three in a cell over in Cherry Hill.
Just look at the power that man has got. Say you
come here with a three to ten-year bit. You serve three
years of it, and go out on your minimum sentence,
with a seven-year parole time over your head. He
hands you a set of rules that not even a Y. M. C. A.
faggot could live up to, and then expects a man who
hasn’t had a drink or a piece of femme for years to
keep those rules. Why, I’ll bet he can’t live up to them
himself. Then, if you get caught drunk, or out with a
broad, any time before that seven years is up, he can
take you back to Charlestown and make you serve
the whole goddam seven years! Why, a judge couldn’t
make you serve that much time for those offenses. Is
it right for any one man to have all that power? There
isn’t one man in a thousand that’s fit to have it. With
So-and-So, it’s gone right to his head. It’s the only
power or prominence he ever had; and he’s got so
that he thinks he’s God, or something.”

"That’s the truth, pal,” says Number Five. "A lot
of those guys get that way. Take the average screw
[guard]. Outside, he’s next thing to a bum. But he
gets a job here, and gets a little authority, and first

Z9

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
thing you know, he’s running around with a chip on
his shoulder, as if he could lick Dempsey. Or take the
average district attorney. Take that crazy bastard
that was over in whatsis county only a little while
ago — So-and-So, I mean. What does a guy like him
do when he gets into office? The first thing he looks
at is the record of the man that had the job before
him. He says to himself, 'Hm, 2750 convictions in
one term. Well, I’ll have to knock hell out of that
record if I want to make any kind of a showing.’
Then, no matter what the case is that comes up before
him, all he is interested in is whether he can get a
conviction — somehow, anyhow. He doesn’t give a
damn about the poor slobs who get pinched in his
county — all he cares about is the record he can make
at their expense. He’s like a salesman, or something,
trying to put across more deals than his rivals.”

“You may be interested to know,” says a prison
scholar, "that the district attorney was originally
elected or appointed as the friend of the common
people. In the days when the judges were all appointed
by the wealthy lords of the manor, the rights of the
people were frequently disregarded by these preju-
diced judges. So the office of people’s attorney was
created, the duties of the people’s attorney being as
follows: he was to examine all the evidence in a given
case and arrive at the impartial truth about it; and to
see that no innocent man was unjustly punished; and
that the rights of the common people were not in-
fringed upon by the wealthy lords. To-day, however,

30

REMEMBERED CONVERSATIONS
the office has become corrupted to the extent that the
district attorney merely uses it as the means of self-
glorification, personal aggrandizement; as a stepping
stone to political or judicial advancement. By having
his name bruited about in connection with notorious
cases, and by securing a record for fast and harsh de-
cisions against a few penniless criminals, he hopes to
have himself made mayor, or governor, or judge, or
whatever his private ambition happens to be. His
object, in our day, is not to discover the truth about
a case, but to secure, by any means, a conviction.”

“Correct as hell. Professor,” says Niunber Ten.
"But you forgot to mention what a lot of thieving
bastards they are, most of them. There isn’t a big city
in this country to-day in which the courts, especially
the district attorneys’ offices, aren’t corrupt as hell.
Remember Tufts and Pelletier and that mob in Bos-
ton? They were busy shaking down millionaires and
nol-prossing cases right and left at so much a head
— and at the same time they were busy sending us
poor bastards to the big house — and the whole lot
of us here didn’t steal as much money in our whole
lives as any one of that mob knocked off in a month.
Most of the district attorneys around the country are
doing the same thing right now; but they’ve got it
down to such a science that they hardly ever get
caught. Look at Chicago. And didn’t they send the
district attorney of Los Angeles County to San
Quentin only a little while ago?”

“Well,” says an old-timer, “what I say is, every-

51

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS

thing’s a racket nowadays — lawyers, judges, district
attorneys, welfare workers, ministers, mayors and
governors (look at Walker, for instance). They’re all
out for the dough, just like we are. If they can get
away with it, I say good luck to them. I’ll steal all I
can, and if I get caught, I’ll take what I get without
any squawking about it. We know that we’re taking
a chance when we start out; and there’s no use try-
ing to whine about it after we wind up in prison.
It’s all in the breaks. You can steal for ten years and
never take a fall; then all of a sudden you’ll get
nothing but tough luck for the next ten years. It’s all
in the racket.”

"Speaking of welfare workers,” says Number
Twelve. "Look at this Miss So-and-So they’ve got
working for the home department. All she does is
runs over to a guy’s wife’s house and tells his wife
that he’s in prison, and that he’s no good anyway, and
that she might as well divorce him, now that she’s
got a good chance to do it. If the wife happens to be
hard up for dough, and asks for any help, what do
they do; they turn her over to the Department of
Charities and make her go after it as if she were a
goddam tramp.”

"I can’t understand those people,” says Number
Nine. "They talk all right, and they seem all right;
but when you come to look at it, what are they really
doing? They’re simply making a job out of it — and
a pretty soft one too. They get paid for doing these
things — and the only guys they seem to help at all
32

REMEMBERED CONVERSATIONS
are these goddam degenerates that are up there in
the guard-room. A regular guy has got too much
pride to go near them — and they don’t seem to be
able to tell a good guy from a dummy head. I sup-
pose they’re just too lazy to try. Long as their job
goes on, and somebody signs slips for the dough they
spend, it’s all the same to most of them, I guess. There
was one of these welfare broads used to come over
here, I remember. She picks out the lousiest bastard
in the whole place — a guy with the syph, that had
raped a young girl — and she not only helps him to
get a pardon, but I’m a dirty bastard if she don’t
marry him when he gets out! Now, how can you
figure a broad like that? She must have just been so
hard up for a man that she was ready to take any
guy that would take her.”

“Yeah,” says Number Nineteen, “and what about
the ministers? Take the chaplain here, for instance.
He’s supposed to be a Christian, and all like that.
But what does he do for us? Not a goddam thing ex-
cept give us a bum sermon every Sunday. Ask him
really to do anything — and you find out he’s just
another one of the solid 'administration’ bums. I guess
the whole story is, they’re all afraid of their jobs, the
poor bastards. They’re told to mind their own busi-
ness and not get too familiar with the cons; and it
costs them their job if they don’t do as they’re told.
You can’t blame ’em, in a way. But what I say is,
guys like that shouldn’t be working here. We need
— guys that have got some guts, and aren’t

33

men

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS

body can do for a guy when he’s in the can, anyhow,
when you come right down to brass tacks.”

“They sure drive a guy dizzy, at that,” says Num-
ber Four. “Visits and mail. They never come on time.
If they say they’ll write or see you on Monday, you’re
lucky if you get a letter or a visit by Saturday. They
don’t stop to figure how a guy feels in here, running
around waiting for them, getting shaved and having
a clean shirt ready. They figure, 'Hell, he ain’t going
anywhere, anyhow, so what’s the difference.’ ”

"You said it,” says Number Nine. “And they al-
ways want to tell a guy what he should do, and like
that. Why don’t they mind their own business. I
never try to tell them what to do. Where does my
old man get off, anyway. He’s been a letter carrier all
his life and spends every extra dime he gets for beer.
He’s never been anywhere, or seen anything. What
does he amount to? Hell, a guy only lives once. Be-
lieve me, v/hen I die I want to be able to say that I
lived. I’ve had enough liquor and lays right now to
last me the rest of my life, if I never get any more of
either. But what has my old man ever had? And where
does he get off to try to tell me how to live. I’d rather
be in the can half the time than be a poor working
stiff like him.”

"What I say,” says Number Fifteen, “is live your
own life. The way I look at it, when a guy’s out on
the racket, he’s a sucker to have anything to do with
working stiffs. What good can they do a guy? Not a
bit. When I meet a guy, I say to myself, 'Now who is
36

REMEMBERED CONVERSATIONS
this guy, and will he ever be able to do me any good?*
And if he’s some kind of a big shot or a politician, or
something, I make it my business to get right in solid
with him. You never can tell when a guy like that
will come in handy; and what’s the use of having
friends if they can’t help you out when you get in a
jam? Where do you think I’d be right now, if I didn’t
know a pile of pollies and big shots? I’d be doing
twenty-five to thirty, or something, instead of three
to five.”

"Sure,” says Number Eight. "Same way in here.
These stew bums and working stiffs, what the hell
good are they? If you know a guy that works in the
storehouse, where he can get you a steak now and
then, that’s all right; but the rest of these bums —
what the hell, you’ll never see the likes of them again,
once you’re on the street. So to hell with them. A guy
has got to look out for his own interests when he’s in
the can, or out on the racket.”

"And take these screws,” says Number Three. "The
only ones I care a rap about are the ones that’ll take
out a letter for a guy, or bring a guy in some swag
now and then. To hell with the rest of them. I know
some of them ain’t bad guys; but when you stop to
figure it out, why, they’re all screws; they all take the
oath, and are ready to shoot you or me if they see vis
trying to crash the wall. So how the hell can you have
anything to do with a guy that you know will give
you the works if he gets a chance? They’re all alike,
that way. Thing is, some are worse than others.”

37

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS

“That’s right, pal,” says Number Five. "And as far
as these broads are concerned — no more for me.
They only get a guy into trouble. They spend all your
dough and leave you flat when you’re broke. And if
the dicks are after you, all they have to do is trail
your broad, and in the end they’ll get you. Naturally
a guy has got to get off the button now and then. But
when I get that way, I’m going out and dig me up a
broad for the night and throw her out with a ten-
doUar bill in the morning. But no more living with
them. Not me! Christ, what do most guys steal for?
If you take everybody’s case in here, rapers, murderers
and all, and trace them back far enough, you’ll find
out that ninety-nine times out of a hundred there’s
some broad at the bottom of it. So I’m going to cut
them out when I get out, believe me. I’ll get one when
I need one, and that’s all.”

"That’s all very true,” says Number Five. "But
goddam it, a guy can’t live without them. Not when
he’s had to go without his fixings for years, like we
have. No matter what you plan to do, you go out
and run into some sweet little thing with big blue eyes
and blond hair — and bing! You’re gone again. You
just can’t help yourself.”

Close by, just near enough to have overheard a part
of this conversation, stands another group of con-
victs. Says one of them:

"These guys that are always belly-aching about
their bits and their broads give me a pain. If they
think so much of their mothers and wives, why the

38

REMEMBERED CONVERSATIONS
hell don’t they cut out stealing and keep out of these
joints? And as far as the broads are concerned, there’s
many a poor bastard right in here that can thank
Christ he’s got a broad to send him a few bucks now
and then. There’s many a broad, take it from me,
that’s gone right out and peddled herself to get dough
for these guys that are putting broads on the pan.
Many a guy wouldn’t even have had the price of a
lawyer if some broad didn’t give it to them.”

"You’re right,” says another. "And did you hear
So-and-So cracking about friends who could do some-
thing for him! He didn’t say anything about him
helping them, did he? There’s a hell of a lot of guys in
here that figure things that way. But what the hell,
a guy don’t pick his friends most of the time. They’re
his friends because they fike him and he likes them;
that’s the way it goes most of the time; and it doesn’t
matter a damn whether they can help him or not. The
thing is, if a guy is right, he’ll always have friends, and
if he isn’t, he’ll never have any. Notice these guys
that are always beefing about their friends laying
down on them, and you’ll find out tliey’re generally
such low-down bastards that they’ve lost all their
friends fcwr that very reason. And as far as a guy’s
family and wife are concerned, I claim that a family
man has no business to be out on the racket, getting
into jams, disgracing his people. It’s bad enough when
you’re all alone and have nobody else to consider.”

I could go on like this for whole volumes, record-

39

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
ing bits of remembered conversations. But why go
on? It must be clear by this time that the conversa-
tions of the average convict are full of destructive
criticism, cheap cynicism, wishfulness and self-pity.
There are, it is true, convicts who are intelligent
enough and intellectually honest enough to have
thoughts and attitudes far superior to those here re-
corded; but as they are in such a very small minority,
they hardly affect the discussion, since my object is
simply to reveal something about the mind of the
average convict.

It may be added (or should I say repeated) that in
any discussion which comes up, the average convict’s
reaction is, "How does that affect me?” Unless it
threatens his comfort, safety or vanity, or promises
to ameliorate or shorten his term in prison, he is
distinctly uninterested. The discussion of ideas for
the sake of arriving at truth, or acquiring knowledge,
has no zest for him. As has been shown, his conversa-
tions consist, not in that free exchange of ideas and
opinions which characterizes the discussions of in-
telligent persons, but in loud and repeated assertions
of his own personal prejudices and beliefs. As may
have been noted, the language of the average convict
is foul in the extreme. This foulness, however, serves
a useful purpose; it enables the student to judge of
the amount of sincerity behind any assertion; for the
more strongly a convict feels, the more fervently he
swears! Finally, as a discerning friend once remarked,
it will be noted that the convict does not talk with but

40

REMEMBERED CONVERSATIONS
at his listener. Which reveals that he is not so inter-
ested in taking in advice or knowledge or information
as he is in merely making a noise and being heard.
This, of course, is a symptom of that essential egotism
which is characteristic of nearly all professional
criminals.

41

Chapter III

Reforming the Criminal

T™ published utterances of leaders in the inter-
national prison reform movement during the past
twenty years show that professional penologists now
subscribe almost unanimously to the following articles
of faith;

I. That it is economically and biologically wasteful,
dangerous, immoral, and on the whole uncivilized, to
imprison the criminal merely to exact vengeance for
the harm he has done society.

II. That the true purpose of imprisonment should
be the eventual rehabilitation of the criminal, for the
eventual benefit of society.

III. That the task of the prison should be, there-
fore, not merely the temporary protection of society
through the incarceration of captured offenders, but
the transformation into law-abiding citizens of as
many criminals as possible.

IV. That the old method of treating the criminal
42

REFORMING THE CRIMINAL
is entirely wrong, since it fails to take into account
the many problems presented by individual criminals,
and that the world of the prison is not one which
prepares them for the free world.

V. That a proper method of treatment should be
based upon careful and exhaustive study of individual
criminals.

VI. That prisons should be remodelled in ac-
cordance with these ideas.

Thus, the declared purpose of modern prison re-
form, one gathers, is: To make the prison an institu-
tion which will reform the criminal.

As I sat in my cell, year after year, reading the
articles, books and speeches in which the penologists
were enunciating this doctrine, I waited eagerly for
some sign of change in the actual administration of
the prison. But nothing happened. I waited in vain.

For I am obliged to record the fact that, during
the years I spent in the state prisons of New York and
Massachusetts, not a single attempt was ever made to
reform me, and that I did not see a single attempt
officially to reform criminals as an aim of prison ad-
ministrative policy.

I remember, in this connection, talking one day
with the late Thomas Mott Osborne about the prison-
reform movement. He said, among other things: “It
is so discouraging. People flock to the meetings; they
are remarkably sound in their responses; they are
shocked, moved, indignant at the right moments;

43

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
they applaud vigorously; they come up to the rostrum
after the meeting and oflfer their money and services;
and then — they go to their homes and forget all
about it. They simply will not do anything.”

For a time I was inclined to accept this explana-
tion; that people in the outside world are simply in-
different about prison conditions. But lately I have
been persuaded that it is not mere indifference, but
actual satisfaction with existing conditions, which
is responsible for society’s delay in changing the prison
"from a human scrap-heap into a human repair-
shop.” It must be, I have decided, that the majority of
people still believe in the ancient doctrine of "an eye
for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth,” and regard the
prison as the place where the criminal shall expiate
his sins.

If, therefore, the real (as it is the declared) object
of imprisonment is the reformation of the convict,
then, as matters stand at present, the American prison
is a most abject failure as a social institution.

It is banal to state that in order to fulfill the ref-
ormation purpose the prison environment must be
greatly altered. Yet, whenever any attempt is made
to do so, there instantly arises a loud and persistent
chorus of criticism, mainly from the daily press. The
cry of pampered criminals, "men’s clubs” arises and
feeds the average law-abiding citizen’s hatred of the
criminal.

This is not to say that the criminal should be pam-
pered and petted, or that the prison should be made
44

REFORMING THE CRIMINAL
a cross between a night club and a health resort.
Neither is it to say that the prison should remain a
steel-barred stone coffin, as it continues to be in most
states. It is simply to say that before the prison can
achieve its object many substantial changes must be
made; and that it will be well for the arm-chair
critics, who create such a disturbance at each attempt
to make such changes, to realize that their prejudiced
criticisms are of great harm, in the end, to that society
of which they themselves are a part. For not until
these changes are made will the prison be able to
transform the criminal into the citizen.

I pause here to discuss a very apropos statement
(from Warden Lawes’s "Twenty Thousand Years in
Sing Sing”) which I find quoted by Harry Hansen
in the June, 1932, issue of Harper’s. As quoted by
Hansen, Warden Lawes writes: "It is a fact very little
appreciated by the average citizen that three out of
every four prisoners from State prison do not return
for new crimes.” Even if this happens to be true of
Sing Sing, where Warden Lawes can hand-pick his
prisoners, sending long-termers and old offenders to
Auburn or Dannemora, it most certainly is far from
true of the average prison. And if he means by this
statement to imply that there has been a marked de-
crease in recidivism, he is talking nonsense of the
most misleading kind. It may be true that many ex-
convicts do not return to the prison whence they were
discharged. Some of them die; others leave the coun-
try; others again keep on stealing with prison-bred

45

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
caution and do not get caught (“Legs” Diamond, for
instance, must have been carried on the books of some
prison as a man who did not return for new crimes) ;
and still others go to prison in other states, their
whereabouts unknown to the prison whence they
were discharged unless they happened to be in ar-
rears for unfinished sentences. This surely cannot be
taken to mean that they do not commit new crimes;
and consequently has no bearing on the question of
recidivism. It will be noted, in any case, that Warden
Lawes does not say they become law-abiding citizens!
But the essential danger of so careless a statement is
that it may lead the unwary to believe that the per-
centage of recidivism is only twenty-five per cent. I
should like to ask Warden Lawes what statistics he
can show in support of this statement. It may interest
him to know that just a short five years ago, during
research for an article on the extent of recidivism in
American prisons, it was my tedious chore to ex-
amine quite a sizable batch of books and statistics, in-
cluding the latest United States Census Report. From
these sources I discovered that recidivism ranged from
forty-nine per cent in one prison to seventy-five per
cent in another, and that the average percentage, as
nearly as I could determine it to be, was about sixty-
five per cent. In no prison did I find a percentage
anything like as low as twenty-five per cent. The
lamentable fact seems to be that about two out of
every three prisoners from state prisons do go out
and commit new crimes. Unfortunately, there are no
46

REFORMING THE CRIMINAL
really reliable statistics on the subject. With the
prison authorities the keeping of such important statis-
tics is usually left to some lazy and incompetent
guard; in prison they are accurate chiefly in counting
the prisoners at stated times. With the parole and
probation officials, figures are frequently juggled to
make out a successful case for the proponents of
parole and probation. In my research, I have run
across no statistics which I consider wholly reliable
and accurate. But from my personal experiences and
observations, and the statistics I have examined, I am
certain that Warden Lawes’s statement is as inaccurate
as it is misleading.

To prove that existing statistics, incomplete and
inaccurate as they are, nevertheless refute the quoted
statement from Warden Lawes’s latest book, I ex-
amined (September, 1932) the latest corrected copy
of the United States Department of Commerce Bul-
letin (Bureau of the Census) for 1928. In this bulletin
it was stated that of 48,212 prisoners received, there
were no reports as to recidivism in the cases of 18,918!
(This shows how carelessly statistics are compiled by
the present crop of incompetent wardens.) Of the
remaining 29,294 prisoners in whose cases there were
records as to previous commitments, 16,543 (or 56.5
per cent) were recidivists — which indicates a per-
centage at least twice as high as that inferentially
contained in Lawes’s statement.

Just a few days ago the Massachusetts Commis-
sioner of Correction, Doctor A. Warren Stearns, con-

47

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
suited his records for the latest available year (1931)
and told me that the percentage of recidivism among
the inmates of the State Prison at Charlestown was
J9.7 per cent — which is also more than twice as
high as Lawes places it.

I know, moreover, how prone the average prison
warden is to understate the case in his official figures.
He hates to admit that his prison is so abject a failure
in its declared purpose of reforming the criminal.
I maintain, therefore, that the true percentage of
recidivism is between 65 per cent and 75 per cent
in the prisons of America, which is exactly the re-
verse of the state of affairs according to Warden
Lawes.

This I very much regret; for Lawes, if he has noth-
ing particularly original or startling to say, has in
late years been a consistent worker in the cause of
sound prison reform, and it is thus doubly deplorable
that he should be guilty of such careless writing. The
general tenor of his latest book, or so I gather from
Hansen’s review of it, leaves no doubt in any one’s
mind, however, of the pertinent fact that the prison
has so far failed in its avowed purpose of transform-
ing criminals into law-abiding citizens.

Existing statistics, as I have above stated, show that
it fails to achieve its object in approximately two out
of three cases. What are the reasons, aside from the
indifference or hostility of public opinion, for this
failure? It is my belief that there are three major
reasons: (a) politics; (b) the attitudes toward ref-
48

REFORMING THE CRIMINAL
ormation of the prison officials; and (c) the attitudes
toward reformation of the criminals themselves.

Let us examine these three reasons in the order
named.

Adequately to gauge the effects of politics upon
the plan to reform the criminal it is necessary to go
to the very top of the governmental structure of the
State. The governor appoints the prison commis-
sioner. The prison commissioner establishes the prison
policy. The governor must support the commissioner,
when newspapers or political enemies seek to em-
barrass the governor’s political party, during real or
fictitious "crime waves,” by unwarranted criticism of
the prison administration. But since governors are
generally not only human but politically ambitious,
the average governor will support the commissioner
only up to that point beyond which his support might
react to his own political disadvantage. Beyond that
point he will rarely give his support. Thus, let the
commissioner be the ablest, most intelligent penologist
on the face of the earth, his freedom to establish a
sound prison system will depend very materially upon
the political fortunes of the governor. This is less
true of States in which a civil service commission reg-
ulates appointments; but by and large the commis-
sioner’s freedom conscientiously to do his duty re-
mains a matter of political accident.

One or two fairly recent instances of the baleful
effects of politics occur to me. Every one remembers,
I daresay, the attempt of the New York politicians to

49

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
ruin the ablest, sincerest, most enlightened prison re-
former of his day. They secured the indictment by a
Grand Jury of Thomas Mott Osborne, in 1916, on a
charge of perjury growing out of his refusal to recog-
nize the authority of a member of a committee of
investigation appointed by Governor Whitman. (Ac-
cording to the terms of the appointment, one member
had no power to conduct an individual investigation.)
This indictment was deliberately distorted by news-
papers of the political opposition into something more
sinister; but after spending more than fifty thousand
dollars on high-priced lawyers in preparation of his
defense, Mr. Osborne was publicly exonerated by the
district attorney of Westchester County, who had
secured the indictment. (This man was years later
disbarred and sent to prison for being implicated in
the corrupt activities of certain bucket-shop brokers.)
Although this plot failed to ruin the intended victim,
who proved to be too strong a man to be thus lightly
brushed aside, it nevertheless retarded the state-prison
reform movement by at least ten years. Except for
this piece of political skull-duggery, the late riots in
Auburn and Dannemora might never have taken
place, and the prisons of New York might now be in
as good a condition as those of present-day Russia or
Germany, whose prison systems are based upon the
very ideas Osborne worked so hard to incorporate
into the New York prison system.

That was sixteen years ago. But only eight years
ago (in 1924) a similar piece of political corruption
50

REFORMING THE CRIMINAL
set the Colorado prison-reform movement back some-
what disastrously. It may be remembered that in that
year the Governor of Colorado appointed a committee
to investigate alleged intolerable conditions in the
Canyon City Prison. As it happened, the warden of
the prison was the governor’s political enemy and had
a great deal of strength in his political party. He not
only refused to permit the committee to enter the
prison, but told the governor (in effect) to mind his
own business. The committee interviewed a number
of former convicts and submitted a tentative report
recommending the removal from office of the war-
den. The governor dismissed him from the warden-
ship. But the warden not only refused to be removed;
he actually barricaded himself within the prison and
successfully defied the governor to remove him. And
at the next election he made a political issue of the
matter, and because of his political strength was
able to defeat the governor (and the establishment
of a sound prison system) at the polls. This is an
extreme case, of course; but it illustrates very well
the manner in which party politics affects prison
reform.

That was eight years ago. To bring the condition
down to the present day, we have the case of the
Governor of Massachusetts who, because of the pres-
ence on his Council of a majority of the opposite
political party, has so far been unable to remove from
office a prison official (the chairman of the parole
board) who, he asserts, is unfit for the job. Whether

51

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
or not the official in question deserves to be removed
is beside the point. The fact is that, because of party
politics, the governor is unable to remove a man
whom he considers incompetent, and appoint a man
whom he believes capable of properly performing the
duties of that office.

There is, I hasten to add, nothing new about this
condition. I remember reading a Report of the Prison
Directors of Massachusetts, published in 1823, in
which the malign effects of politics upon the prison
system are quite colorfully commented upon. But if
the condition is not new, it is certainly more dan-
gerous in these lawless times than it has ever been in
the past. Now, as never before, society is in need of
a prison system which — by reforming as many
criminals as possible — will protect her from even
greater lawlessness in the future. So long, however, as
the condition remains unchanged; so long as the estab-
lishment of a sound prison system depends so greatly
upon the accidents of political careers, it is some-
what unreasonable to expect anything worth while
in the way of sound prison reform.

Let me state the importance of the case of the
prison officials in a nutshell. Once the criminal has
been apprehended, almost any lawyer can present the
evidence against him to a jury; and once he has been
convicted, almost any person with legal training can
sentence him in accordance with existing laws. In
both cases the problem is mainly one of technicalities
of procedure. But when it comes to the execution of

REFORMING THE CRIMINAL
the sentence itself — there is a real difficulty, if the
sentence implies reformation.

To the warden of twenty years ago his job was a
simple matter. He merely had to hang, electrocute,
or keep the criminal.

But a new conception of the duties of the prison
has entered into social consciousness: that the prime
function of the prison is re-education; this necessarily
requires the highest type of educators. Who are the
educators whom American society actually selects?

Let me describe some of the men whom society
has actually selected for this important task. Since
they were of such various types that one was a ha-
bitual drunkard while another was a university gradu-
ate, whom I have always considered a truly great man,
I shall make no attempt to write a personality sketch
of each subject, but merely to indicate to what ex-
tent they were men capable of being good prison
wardens.

The first one — let us call him Bruce — was a big
raw-boned Scotsman who became a prison guard very
soon after he arrived in America. After fifteen years
as a guard, he became the deputy warden of the prison,
and upon the retirement of an old warden, suc-
ceeded him in that position. He was to all intents and
purposes illiterate (the prison clerk often covers a
multitude of educational defects in the warden). But
if he was ignorant and normally inarticulate, he was
eminently honest and fair, if a bit stern, in his deal-
ings with prisoners. Having been a steady, but moder-

53

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
ate drinker all his life, in his later years when he was
incurably ill, he became practically a habitual drunk-
ard. He spent most of his last days in a speakeasy
located within a stone’s throw of the prison, and dur-
ing the last two years of his term was seen only six
or eight times inside the walls. He was warden for
about five years. During that time he did not make
a single important change in the prison regulations,
and during his last two years left the administration
of the prison almost eUtirely in the hands of the prison
clerk and the deputy warden. Despite his constant
drinking, and the fact that it was common gossip
among prisoners and guards that he was drinking him-
self to death, Bruce never permitted himself to be seen
intoxicated within the prison. I am frank to say that
I liked and respected Bruce a great deal, as a man. He
was personally honest and aboveboard (what we called
a “square-shooter”), entirely above personal mean-
ness or spite, and wholly trustworthy. But as a warden,
I am equally frank to say that I disliked him greatly.
He was unqualified by education or natural intelli-
gence to be anything better than a good prison guard.
He was stupid, incompetent, with no faintest con-
ception of a higher duty than the literal execution of
the court’s sentence. His attitude toward ideas —
even in the field in which he might be expected to be
interested — is very well illustrated in the following
bit of conversation I once had with him. A friend had
sent me two books: Dostoevsky’s “Crime and Punish-
ment” and Osborne’s “Society and Prisons.” The
54

REFORMING THE CRIMINAL
warden had sent me word that I would not be allowed
to receive these books, and I had sent him a note of
protest in which I asked for an interview in which we
might discuss the matter. I found Bruce waiting for
me in the guardroom, idly thumbing over the Osborne
volume. I could tell from the expression of his face
that he was very suspicious of a man who wanted to
read such books. W^as I a prison agitator or merely a
harmless "nut?”

"You know, Victor,” said Bruce, "books like these
here, well, we don’t allow them in here. There’s a rule
about that. What do you want with them, anyhow?”

"I want to read them,” I said. "I’ve heard a great
deal of talk about them and am interested in the sub-
jects they cover.”

"That’s all right,” said Bruce. "But you know
there’s a rule about it. We can’t have books like this
kicking around the place. They’re li’ble to put ideas
into the boys’ heads.”

“As far as the rule is concerned,” I said, “you made
it yourself, so I guess you can break it if you want to.
And I have no idea of letting these books get kicked
around the place. What’s wrong with these books, if
you don’t mind telling me? Why do you object to
them?”

"Oh,” said Bruce, waving a stubby hand as it were
to indicate the futility of trying to answer so ridicu-
lous a question. “This kind of stuff is — well, it’s silly.
You know what Osborne is — ”

"Well,” I ventured to interrupt him, "no matter

55

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
what you may think Osborne is, I have been told that
he has some very good ideas, and Fd like to study
them. By the way, Warden, have you read this book
yourself?”

"Bless ye, lad!” said Bruce, slapping his thigh and
giving vent to a deep chuckle. "Fve got no time to be
wasting on stuff like this. You won’t find many old-
time prison men paying much attention to a feller like
Osborne. D’ ye think, now, he can tell us anything
about prisons? Ha, ha, ha!”

“No,” I said, "and that’s just the trouble. None of
you old-time prison men will listen to anything new,
or — ”

"Tut tut, now, Victor,” said Bruce, aware that I
was about to wax sarcastic. "Keep your shirt on, my
boy!” He looked at me intently for a minute, then
added, "I tell you what I’ll do, Victor. I’ll let you
have these here books for a few days. You take and
read them yourself; but don’t pass them around
among the men. When you get through with them,
bring them back to me, and I’ll put them away until
you go out. Is that all right?”

"Yes, Warden,” said I, knowing that in a few days
he would probably have forgotten all about them.
"Thank you very much.”

The man was not only opposed to new ideas, he was
quite devastatingly uninterested in them, deeming it
the very quintessence of the ludicrous that 1 should
have asked him to read a book about prisons. He was
simply an ignorant, imintelligent, well-meaning man,
56

REFORMING THE CRIMINAL
in no way capable of being a good warden; he was
essentially nothing but a glorified turnkey.

Crossett — as we shall call the second warden —
began his career as a patrolman on a city police force.
On being accused of having attempted criminally to
assault a girl who lived on his beat, Crossett resigned
from the force, and in time got himself accepted as a
prison guard. After this poor start, it seemed unlikely
that he would ever rise higher; but Crossett had po-
litical connections, and after about fifteen years as a
guard was made deputy warden when Bruce was
made warden. He was a corpulent, excessively pom-
pous man, vastly self-important and addicted to mak-
ing allegedly humorous remarks at which the prison
toadies — guards as well as prisoners — were ex-
pected to roar with glee. Having become deputy
warden, he was satisfied, at first, never expecting to
become warden, since Bruce appeared to be a very
healthy man. But appearances were deceitful, and
Bruce became an incurably ill man and proceeded to
drink himself to death. During the last two years of
Bruce’s term, Crossett was warden in everything but
name; and during this time, he devoted most of his
energies to building up his political connections; so
that when Bruce died, it was inevitable that he should
succeed him. As warden, he was very much like Bruce
except that he was a more suave man, always careful
not to offend any one — prisoner or governor — who
had the power to frustrate his remaining ambition
(which was to retire as quickly as possible on the half-

57

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
pay of a warden) . He made one or two minor changes
in the prison regulations; but, like Bruce, did not feel
bound to treat his charges as anything other than
criminals who must be sheltered, clothed and fed, and
prevented from escaping, for specihed periods of
time. Unlike Bruce, who was wise enough to perceive
that selfish motives usually actuate the informer,
Crossett depended almost entirely upon “rats” to keep
him informed as to the activities of prisoners and
guards alike, and greatly favored them in the matter
of good jobs and special privileges. For this he was
disliked, as well as for his general unreliableness. He
was in all things typically the small-town politician,
smoothing his way along with meaningless promises
and empty talk. He was known varioxisly as “The
Rapey” or “Old Blubberhead” by the inmates. As a
warden, he was even more incompetent and futile
than Bruce.

The third warden may be called Shuttleworth. His
first contact with prison work was made when, as a
young man, he became “farm boss” of a state-prison
farm camp. Eventually he became superintendent of
the camp and later of the state reformatory. Through
political influence (Shuttleworth was something of a
political boss in hb home bailiwick) he was in time
made warden of the state prison upon the retirement
of a warden who had been in office for twenty-five
years. Shuttleworth’s two great assets were oral glib-
ness and an excessively ambitious and talented wife.
Utilizing as best she could her husband’s flair for
58

REFORMING THE CRIMINAL
oratory, his impressive bulk, and his general docility,
Shuttleworth’s wife kept smoothing down the vari-
ous roughnesses of his various contours, her ambition
being to make of him a personage like the famous
Warden Osborne, or even Warden Lawes. She drilled
him in the social and personal graces and even had
him misquoting Shakespeare (because of a faulty
memory) in the prison chapel. In time he became a
very unctuous, superficially intellectual man. Since
his predecessor, who had been warden for twenty-five
years, had been very backward in his ideas, it was
very simple for Shuttleworth to appear progressive
and modern by making some extremely trifling
changes in the prison routine. Nothing that he did dur-
ing his four years in office was of any real significance.
He was a perfectly harmless person, normally good-
natured, but with the tendency toward blustering
brutality which is so often characteristic of the timid
man. He seemed to be greatly embarrassed by having
been pushed higher up in the social structure than he
had ever expected to climb and had not the intelli-
gence or the ability to adapt himself to the new alti-
tude. In crises he was faint-hearted, deathly afraid of
even the mildest newspaper criticism or anything else
which seemed to threaten his job. He was inclined, at
first, to be guided by the ideas and examples of the
best penologists of the day; but after observing what
happened to other men who had the courage of their
convictions — notably Osborne — Shuttleworth lost
his nerve and became simply another stuffed shirt.

59

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
To the end of his term he failed to rise to his fine op-
portunity and died without having done a bit of work
which was of any value to society.

The fourth warden I served under was Commodore
Wadhams of the United States Navy. It is hardly fair,
however, to class him as a warden. He was essentially
the naval officer and accepted command of the
prison as he would have accepted command of a ship.
He took command of the Naval Prison (I believe at
the request of Osborne) when Osborne resigned, after
establishing there a branch of his Mutual Welfare
League. At the time Commodore Wadhams was a hale
and hearty old man more than seventy years of age.
He was essentially the naval officer, and a very fine
leader of men. Although he had had, I believe, no pre-
vious experience as a warden, he was heartily in sym-
pathy with Osborne’s ideas and remarkably willing to
learn what he did not know about prisons and prison-
ers. He had a mind of his own too; a very keen one.
When the League seemed to be falling down on its
job, he did not hesitate to suspend it and begin over
again with a new one. He had a high sense of his own
obligations, not only to society, but to the men placed
in his care, and tried in every way to perform the
whole duty of the warden. The last of the old commo-
dores (the title having long ago been abolished) , Com-
modore Wadhams tackled a strange and difficult job
and performed it with great sincerity and with
marked success.

The fifth warden we shall call Jenkins (I mention
6o

REFORMING THE CRIMINAL
only the true names of those wardens about whom I
can say something good). Jenkins was essentially the
militarist. As a young man, he joined the National
Guard and at the outbreak of the World War held a
Brigadier-General’s commission in that organization.
He had been warden only a shwt time when the War
broke out, and was in France for about two years on
leave of absence from the prison. Returning to his
duties, he found that things had changed a great deal
at Blanksburg Prison. An inmate organization (The
Mutual Welfare League) , which had been established
during the regime of his predecessor, had grown very
powerful, so that the prisoners had more to say about
the administration of the prison than Jenkins thought
reasonable. Jenkins was a very able and intelligent
man. But he was a man with a wide streak of stub-
bornness in his disposition. As a young and completely
inexperienced warden (his appointment was due to
the influence of a National Guard General who hap-
pened to be a close friend of the governor of the
State), Jenkins had acquired the notion that the
prison should be as nearly like a military training
camp as possible. There is a great deal to be said for
this idea, too. The daily physical exercise entailed in
marching, calisthenics, and the like is of great value
not only to the body, but to the mind as a disciplinary
measure. But the thing can easily be carried too far.
After all, the purpose is not to make soldiers of the
prisoners. At all events, Jenkins was strongly imbued
with the military idea and greatly resented the power

6i

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
represented by the Mutual Welfare League. It is true,
by the way, that the League did in many ways abuse
its power and thus made it easy for Jenkins to criti-
cize and decry its worth as a system of prison manage-
ment. I have no brief to hold, here and now, for the
Mutual Welfare League; and neither am I an advocate
of Jenkins’s militarism. I am trying to make an honest
estimate of Jenkins as a prison warden. In so doing, I
must point out that Jenkins had had no experience at
all in prison management before he came to Blanks-
burg; that he was, like most prison wardens, over-
burdened with a multiplicity of executive and ad-
ministrative work, which left him little time and
energy for giving the prisoners the careful attention
they need if they are to be helped on the road back
to honesty; that he was handicapped by the fact that
the wardens of the two other state prisons could (and
did) send him many prisoners whom they had found
too difficult to control. Some part of Jenkins’s failure
to become a good warden, therefore, must be ascribed
to these causes. Nevertheless, Jenkins was an intelli-
gent, competent man, and could have overcome even
these difficulties, had he been sufficiently interested.
He could have left most of the executive and admin-
istrative work in the hands of his secretary or the
prison clerk, and devoted his time to the really im-
portant task of the warden — and Jenkins was one
of the few wardens I have known who fully recog-
nized this duty. Incensed, however, by the growing
power of the prisoners’ organization, and deeming it
6z

REFORMING THE CRIMINAL
inadvisable to come out openly against it (for the
power and prestige of Osborne were vast in his State) ,
Jenkins spent a great deal of time and effort under-
mining the work of the Mutual Welfare League, hold-
ing it responsible for escapes, riots, and anything else
which happened; and at long last, after nearly los-
ing his own life in an attempted jail delivery during
which he was held in hostage by the prisoners, Jenkins
was permitted to resign after an investigating com-
mittee had placed a goodly measure of the blame upon
the Mutual Welfare League (which was thereupon
disestablished) . If Jenkins had been wise enough to
come out openly against the League, and openly per-
form his task as he honestly believed it should be
performed, he would have made a very fine warden.
But in his sub rosa efforts to undermine the League
he did the cause of sound prison reform a great deal
of harm. Since the establishment of the League in
Blanksburg, the prison had become a place where
every effort was made to give the prisoner a chance to
educate and prepare himself for an honest life in the
free world. He was permitted to take part in the com-
munity life of the prison, to enact and enforce laws,
to share civic responsibility and familiarize himself
with the normal workings of the average free com-
munity. It is the basic idea behind the League that, as
playing tennis is the best practice for the future tennis
player, so life in a relatively free community is the
best practice for the future free citizen. If Jenkins
thought this idea imsound, it was his duty to say so,

65

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
and to fight openly for the establishment of the sys-
tem he thought more logical and likely to be success-
ful. That he did not do so was the reason for his
failure as a warden. Whether or not the League is the
best system devisable does not matter. Warden Lawes
has retained it at Sing Sing, and Osborne and others
have used it successfully in other prisons. It was hardly
fair of Jenkins, therefore, to pretend to support it
while he was secretly fighting it from motives of mere
personal prejudice. This was fair neither to him nor
to the League. As a matter of truth, I am compelled
to say that I liked Jenkins, personally, as well as any
warden I have ever met; but I am likewise compelled
to say that in his anti-League activities he put Blanks-
burg Prison back on its 1912 basis — as a prison in
which men are merely to be fed, housed and clothed
for the length of time determined by the court. Jen-
kins, therefore, was not guilty of merely shirking his
duty, like Shuttleworth; he was guilty of the worse
crime of grossly abusing the powers of his office to
frustrate the sincere attempts of the prisoners and
their outside friends to make the prison a training
camp for personal reformation.

The last of the six wardens under whom I have
served time was Thomas Mott Osborne. His work is
too well known to need much description here. In
his various books — "Society and Prisons”, "Within
Prison Walls”, "Prisons and Common Sense”, and
"Sing Sing Prison, a Study in American Politics” (the
latter has not yet been published owing to opposition
64

REFORMING THE CRIMINAL
on the part of his heirs) — he has stated his ideas and
described his efforts to incorporate them into the ad-
ministrative systems of American prisons. That he was
by far the most intelligent and high-minded warden
I have ever served under need hardly be said. The
higher duty of the warden was his very religion. He
was glad to leave mere administrative details to clerks
and assistants (even hiring them at his own expense
when necessary — as, of course, the average warden
could not afford to do) , and to devote every minute
of his time to the important work of giving his intel-
ligence to the solution of the individual problems of
individual prisoners, and to the working out of a self-
governing-community system which, he felt, was the
one most likely to succeed in transforming the prison-
ers into law-abiding citizens. In his utter devotion to
the cause of sound prison reform — in the way he
gave unstintedly of his time, energy, intelligence and
money — he was in my opinion a noble man. For
what is a noble man, if not a man who devotes his
life and talents and money to the establishment of
what he believes to be the truth? There are, as usual,
no statistics available which might give accurate fig-
ures in support of my statement; but I am sure that
more men were led back into the road of decent living
through the work of Osborne than through the work
of any man or any organization which has ever tried
to influence the criminal. There is not the space here
for a detailed discussion of Osborne and his fine work
(the reader will, however, find it adequately described

65

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
not only in Osborne’s books, but in books like Frank
Tannenbaum’s "Wall Shadows”, which is a study of
the Mutual Welfare League System of prison manage-
ment) . I will merely say that Osborne was in many
ways the perfect warden. That he was liberally en-
dowed with financial means and social and political
standing does not alter this essential fact; for it should
be the duty of society so to support her wardens that
any one of them, should he have the talent and the
intelligence, might be free to function as eflfectively
as Osborne did. It is surely not fair to society to
impose so difficult a task upon the warden and
then handicap him so badly that he cannot per-
form it.

In these brief descriptions of the wardens under
whom I have served time, I have indicated only in a
general way why they were good or bad wardens. I
must now point out why, under existing conditions, it
is almost impossible for the average warden to be any-
thing but a bad one. In this connection I remember
reading a report of the Massachusetts Prison Directors
published in 1823 which is singularly in point. Under
the laws governing the State Prison at that time, the
internal administration of the prison was left entirely
to a Chief Guard or Principal Keeper (the Deputy
Warden of the present day) . He was responsible only
to the directors of the prison (three men appointed
by the governor) , who were in turn responsible to the
state legislature. There was no such office in existence
as that of warden! This office was created under the
66

REFORMING THE CRIMINAL
political spoils system, so that an important vote-
getter might be given a soft job. The duties of the
warden were simple. He was to accept prisoners from
the court and transfer them to the prison; and to
bring prisoners to court for trial, and so forth. He
was a mere server of papers, in other words, for which
he received extra fees. In time, of course, the warden
being a man of political influence, he began to usurp
the powers of the principal keeper; and eventually
the principal keeper became merely the warden’s as-
sistant, as he is at the present time. But while the pow-
ers lodged in the two offices have changed places, the
duties of each remain substantially what they were in
1823! That is to say, the actual internal management
of the prison is left very much to the deputy warden,
while the warden does all the paper work (theoreti-
cally, of course; actually it is performed largely by
clerks) .

In this lies one of the fundamental weaknesses of
most present-day systems of prison management. For
the warden, instead of spending his time inside the
prison in close contact with his charges, spends nearly
all of his time in the administrative oflSces, and sees
the prisoners only during chapel services or during
special interviews. The man who is in daily contact
with the prisoners is the man least capable of perform-
ing the higher duty of the warden. For the deputy
warden, or principal keeper, is the man who actually
manages the internal affairs of the prison, apportion-
ing jobs, awarding punishments or rewards, and other-

67

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
wise directly coming in contact with the prisoners.
Now in all the years I have spent in various prisons,
I have never seen a deputy warden or principal keeper
who was not a promoted guard. And if the average
warden, who is sometimes not an ex-guard but an
outside man with a fresh outlook, is so incompetent
to perform the higher duty of the warden, how can it
be expected that the average ex-guard, as deputy
warden, will be able to perform it? I have served time
under eight deputy wardens or principal keepers, but
I only know one who was even remotely capable of
perceiving and attempting to perform this duty.

Overburdened as he is with administrative details,
the average warden is only too glad to leave the man-
agement of the prison to the deputy warden. Even
when he is intelligent enough to leave these details to
clerks and devote himself to his real duty, the warden
is handicapped; because the average deputy warden
resents what he considers the warden’s infringements
of rights and powers which have been the deputy
warden’s since the office was created. Friction thus
arises, as is inevitable, which is disastrous to the morale
of the prison. The only way in which this friction can
be removed lies in a complete reorganization of the
personnel of the prison. The administrative details
(bookkeeping, the keeping of statistics, and the like)
should be handled by clerks from the prison com-
missioner’s office. This would leave the warden free to
perform his duties. The deputy warden should act as
Captain of the Guards, and attend to the policing and
68

REFORMING THE CRIMINAL
disciplining of the prison. The higher duty of study-
ing his prisoners and attempting to transform them
into law-abiding citizens should be left entirely to the
warden. The warden should, of course, be a well-
educated, sincere, intelligent man. He should be paid
a decent salary. For only when the prisons are re-
organized, and the duties of the various officials thus
clearly defined, will the capable warden be given a
real chance to do his duty; and only when he is able
to do his duty will the prisons begin to perform their
acknowledged purpose.

But in the long run none of these things can be
accomplished until the prison is taken out of politics.
Under existing conditions, the office is one which the
governor feels he must give to some political supporter
or to an appointee of that supporter, regardless of
the man’s ability to do the required work. With po-
litical corruption rampant all over the country, how-
ever, it is hardly likely that much attention will be
paid to the selecting of capable men as wardens of our
prisons. Of the wardens of the State Prison at Charles-
town, for example, three (including the present in-
cumbent) have been former prison guards who rose
from the ranks through political influence. Two
wardens died while I was serving time there. In each
case, although the prison commissioner had recom-
mended the appointment of a comparatively high-
grade outside man, the former prison guard secured
the appointment through party politics. Let it not be
thought, therefore, that conditions in this respect are

69

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
very much better than they were a hundred years
ago. I venture to say that they are worse.

It thus comes about that wardens, as a group, due
allowance being made for the rare exceptions, are in-
capable of anything beyond the mere literal execution
of the court’s sentence. They are capable, after a
fashion, of feeding, clothing, housing, and keeping in
custody the convicted criminals sent to them by the
courts. It is unreasonable, really, to expect anything
more from them. If, therefore, society is satisfied
merely to punish the criminal, her wardens are emi-
nently capable of performing the task. But if the de-
clared purpose of imprisonment is actually the real
purpose — if, that is, society’s real object is the
reformation of the criminal — precious little progress
will be made through the efforts of the present crop
of wardens.

Even when an occasional warden of a better type,
spurred on, it may be, by an able, sincere prison com-
missioner, becomes a convert to the new faith and de-
sires to lend a hand, he is rarely able to accomplish
very much. Political interference, the opposition of
ignorant but well -organized guards, the burdens of
administrative detail work, the hostility of prisoners,
personal inefficiency through lack of training; all
these things render the warden more or less incapable
of doing his higher duty toward society and toward
the criminal.

In the end, up against these and other difficulties
beyond his powers of control, the average warden
70

REFORMING THE CRIMINAL
takes the easiest way out of his dilemma and lapses
into a deliberate policy of laissez-faire. So long as
there is a semblance of discipline within the prison;
so long as there are no serious riots and escapes; so long
as he can literally execute the sentence of the court
and retire on half -pay as quickly as possible, the
average warden is satisfied to let things take their
course. His chief concern is to produce good prison-
ers (men who cheerfully obey, or at any rate do not
get caught breaking, prison regulations) . Whether or
not this is likely to make them good citizens when
they are released does not greatly concern him. And
this, I firmly believe, is the attitude of the average
American prison warden.

What I have said about the average warden applies
with even greater force to the average prison guard.
For whereas the average warden is a fairly energetic
man, the average prison guard is quite the reverse.
Whatever he may have been to begin with, the duties
of the average prison guard have made him an in-
credibly lazy fellow. Sitting in a soft chair, hour after
hour, year after year, with nothing more strenuous to
do than keep his eye on the prisoners at work in the
shop, the prison guard soon becomes a pretty dull,
listless sort of man. And since every attempt to im-
prove upon the prison environment involves, at first,
longer hours and more strenuous activity for the
guard, he actively opposes (through the various asso-
ciations of prison guards) most plans for prison re-
form. As an instance of this, Osborne was unable to

71

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
enlist even the pretended cooperation of New York
prison guards until a law establishing an eight -hour
working day had been passed. In most states the
guards work ten or twelve hours a day and are
scarcely to be blamed for resenting any increase in
their working hours. But until shorter hours are ob-
tained for them (and even afterwards, for other rea-
sons) it will be found that the average prison guard is
opposed to the reform of the prison environment.

On the whole, then, it must be said that the atti-
tudes of wardens and prison guards are distinctly un-
favorable to the success of society’s plan to reform
the criminal.

7a

chapter IV

The Prisoner and Reformation

T .

XHE third factor in the problem is the attitude
toward reformation of the criminal himself. Here it
is necessary to go slowly. It is one thing to generalize
about the attitudes of wardens and prison guards. This
can be done with a fair margin of safety, since there
is a certain class attitude, generated by similarities in
duties, training, social status, and the like, which is
characteristic of the whole group of wardens and
prison guards. But when we generalize about crimi-
nals, it is well to remember that there are almost as
many criminal types as there are individual criminals;
and that hasty generalizations which ignore this fact
are likely to be inaccurate, unscientific and mislead-

However, in order to discuss their attitudes at all, it
is necessary to make some attempt to accurate clas-
sification. Disregarding the fact that there are many in-
terrelated types; that some murderers and rapers are
thieves, and some thieves are also rapers and murder-

73

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
ers; and that no system of classification can hope to
achieve absolute accuracy, let us arbitrarily divide
imprisoned criminals into four groups: ( i ) murder-
ers, (2) rapers, (3) circumstantial criminals, and (4)
professional criminals.

Let us exclude from the first group all gunmen and
gangster killers, and other professionals who kill only
when they are hindered in their attempts to steal or
to terrorize. Let us mean by "mmderers” only those
persons who have killed their victims because of greed,
lust, jealousy, anger, hatred, desire for revenge, or
similar passions. As previously noted (in "Remem-
bered Conversations”), this group, the murderers,
generally holds to the conventional views about law
and order of average citizens in the free world. While
each murderer feels that he was wholly or partly justi-
fied in killing his victim, he does not approve of mur-
der as a form of social behavior, nor of lawlessness in
any form. Since he is thus essentially law-abiding in
his attitude, it is somewhat idle to talk of “reform-
ing” him. Because of this, it is my conviction that the
mtirderer is not a problem for the penologist and does
not belong in a state prison; but is a problem for the
psychiatrist, and should receive treatment in a hospi-
tal for criminal psychopathies.

In the second group, the rapers, l^t us include all
men who have been sent to prison because of sexual
misconduct; for rape, seduction, incest, abuse of
minor children, sodomy, oral copulation, or any other
form of illegal sexual conduct. Like that of the mur-
74

PRISONER AND REFORMATION
derer, the attitude of the taper is essentially that of
the law-abiding citizen. And like the murderer he
belongs, or so I believe, in a hospital for criminal psy-
chopathies.

We now come to the third group, in which is found
the man who may be called the circumstantial crimi-
nal. He may be defined as the man who ordinarily
lives an honest life, but occasionally, because of un-
propitious circumstances in his physical, intellectual,
emotional or social environments, resorts to crime. A
criminal of this type steals because (a) of an immedi-
ate and urgent need for money; (b) in order to
finance the seduction (or it may be the legitimate
wooing) of some woman who has temporarily or
permanently become vital to his emotional needs; (c)
because of inability to resist temptation when it strikes
him at a weak moment, or (d) in order to finance his
escape from an environment which, for one reason or
other, has become intolerable. Among such criminals
are to be found most low-grade thieves, defaulting
cashiers, trusted employees and the like. They are
normally law-abiding, and even when they yield to
temptation there is nothing deliberately antisocial in
their attitudes; it is defeat at the hands of the environ-
ment which causes them to steal and not disrespect
for law and order as such. This type of criminal, even
when he is a third or four offender, is generally docile
and teachable and capable of reform. Under proper
guidance he can be made an asset to the community.
It is with this group, or type, that the penologist will

75

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
have the greatest success. For they are not what I call
true criminals; they are, in the apt phrase of an Eng-
lish observer (A. P. Gardiner, in the Nineteenth Cen-
tury magazine), merely "sheep in wolves’ cloth-
ing.”

Finally, we come to the real wolves of the prison
fold; those criminals who have a definite, deliberate,
antisocial attitude, and devote their whole lives to
crime. In this group are to be found the bank bandit,
the highwayman, the burglar, the gunman, the gang-
ster, the forger, the confidence man, and the high-
grade swindler who operates through crooked stock
transactions or other business disguises. Although not
all of them are deliberately antisocial in their atti-
tudes, the great majority of them are; and so I con-
sider them the only true professional criminals. In
even his lowest stages of development, the criminal of
this type is dangerous; in his high stages of develop-
ment he is positively deadly. He ranges from the petty
forger of small checks to the accomplished swindler;
from the man who injures individuals to the man who
wrecks institutions and whole sections of the com-
munity in ruthless grasping for illegitimate money and
power. Let me try to describe the development of a
few specimens of this type; for in his development
are to be found the reasons for his attitude toward life
in general and toward law and order and reformation
in particular. In so doing, I shall describe only the
cases of actual criminals I have known, and devote
the most space to those phases of their development
76

PRISONER AND REFORMATION
which least often find their way into the ordinary
case histories of penologists.

The Case of Elsmore

Elsmore was born in Boston in 1898 of German-
English parents. They were poor but law-abiding peo-
ple, the father sickly, the mother obliged to take in
washing and do occasional odd jobs of cleaning for
neighbors. Young Elsmore was left to himself a great
deal and instinctively sought the company of other
boys of his own age. It was a slum neighborhood in
which most of the boys were young hoodlums, and
soon Elsmore became one of the tougher boys of the
district. He began to absent himself from school,
smoke cigarettes, frequent poolrooms and other for-
bidden places, and to steal anything he could find (old
clothes, bottles, brass and copper, and anything else
which might be sold to the junkman) . At the age of
fourteen he was haled into court as a truant and sent
to a school for delinquent boys (where I met him) .
Big for his age, he was a good athlete, and in time be-
came one of the athletic heroes of the school. He had
gone as far as the fifth grade before he came to the
place, but would not show any interest in further
formal education, deeming it sissified to study. He was
assigned to work in the manual training department,
where husky boys were needed, and soon became a
muscular young devil, with a very aggressive manner.
The master of the cottage in which Elsmore lived had

77

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
a daughter who had been away at boarding school but
was with her parents for the summer. She was eighteen
years old and a very attractive girl. Elsmore was one
of several dozen boys in the cottage who secretly
worshipped her. He used to slip out of the shop, when-
ever there was a chance, and hurry over to the cot-
tage for a glimpse of her. One day he caught her on
the way to her bedroom after a bath, with hardly a
stitch of clothes on, and attempted to rape her (Els-
more at the age of fifteen was fully developed sexu-
ally). She fought him off successfully, but did not
report him to her father. This made him bolder; and
in time she yielded and permitted him to seduce her.
During the remainder of his term, when she was at
home, they met at every opportunity and indulged in
the forbidden sexual pleasure. Of course Elsmore
bragged about his conquest and thought himself quite
the cock of the walk. As a result of this, and of his
popularity as an athletic hero, he gained an exalted
idea of his own importance and developed into a
pretty conceited fellow. On being released, he im-
mediately became dissatisfied with the environment in
which his parents had to live. At the school he had
been something of a celebrity, about whom every one,
especially the younger boys, made a great deal of fuss.
In the free world he was merely another unruly boy,
without distinction among his associates. He disliked
this state of affairs very much and commenced to do
everything in his power to gain prestige of some kind.
He broke into houses and stores at night, swaggered

78

PRISONER AND REFORMATION
about with a gun in his pocket, and bragged a great
deal about exploits which gave evidence of his cour-
age and general toughness. With the proceeds of his
crimes he dressed himself in the sportiest of clothes
and was soon one of the neighborhood "sheiks.” He
refused to go either to school or to work, and in a
short time was one of the steady customers of the
neighborhood dance hails, poolrooms and houses of ill
fame. Too conceited to work or study, selfish, agres-
sive, and utterly unmanageable, his parents and
friends could do nothing with him. So greatly did he
resent any attempt to alter his manner of living that
he began to carry his gun with a real purpose: in
order to shoot any one who tried to hinder him in his
nocturnal crimes. Suspected of various petty crimes,
he was again haled into court and ordered recom-
mitted to the school for delinquent boys. This time
there was no indulgent master’s daughter to help him
allay his sexual desires (he was placed in a different
cottage, talk of the affair with the girl having eventu-
ally reached the ears of officials) . He started to
masturbate. Before he came out again he was a con-
firmed masturbator. Perhaps because of this (at any
rate partly because of it) he grew distinctly irritable
and surly in his behavior. It seemed to be his desire
to earn a reputation for toughness and general incor-
rigibility. He ran away from the school twice, only to
be captured and returned each time; and after the
second escape was transferred to the state reformatory.
Here he served two years and, because of his tough-

79

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
ness and athletic skill, again became something of a
popular hero among the younger inmates. But be-
cause of his conceit and snobbishness he made no real
friends among his associates; and when he was dis-
charged, at the age of nineteen, he became a surly
"lone wolf” in his criminal activity. This was in 1917,
just after America entered the War. Excessively ad-
dicted to masturbation while incarcerated, and to
sexual indulgence when free, Elsmore soon noticed
how the neighborhood girls preferred the uniformed
sailors and soldiers; and he joined the navy solely in
order to further the satisfaction of his sexual needs.
He was stationed at a receiving ship near Boston and
was able to spend most of his time (nights) ashore.
Since his pay as an enlisted man was barely enough to
keep him in taxicabs, he kept on breaking into houses
and stores when he was short of ready money; and by
this time was a very skillful burglar. A year after
joining the navy, while on a drunken spree with an-
other sailor and two girls, Elsmore overstayed his
leave and decided to desert from the navy rather than
take a chance of being sentenced to the Naval Prison
by a court-martial board. He was now in fairly des-
perate straits. If he were arrested even on suspicion,
and identified, he was sure to be sent either to the
Naval Prison or back to the state reformatory as a
parole violator. So great was his horror of imprison-
ment and the inevitable sexual hunger, that he de-
termined to kill, if necessary, rather than to be taken.
After a series of burglaries in an exclusive residential
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PRISONER AND REFORMATION
district which won for him the newspaper sobriquet
of "The Human Fly”, he became reckless; and instead
of moving to a new territory, continued to break into
houses in the same neighborhood. He gloried in the
newspaper write-ups which followed each of his
crimes. One night, climbing down a water -spout after
burglarizing a house, he was caught unprepared by a
policeman. He attempted to draw his gun; but the
policeman shot him in the leg and overpowered him
before Elsmore could get his own gun out. He was
convicted of several burglaries and of carrying dan-
gerous weapons, and given a ten- to fifteen-year term
in the state prison (where again I met him) .

Because of the newspaper notoriety during his
career and trial, Elsmore became afflicted with a very
pronounced "big shot” complex, as we used to call
it. He thought of himself as the "master burglar” he
had been called by the papers, and became very con-
descending to the lesser criminal lights of the place.
He was a snob of the first water and would associate
with none but other celebrities like himself (when
they would let him) . In his attitude toward law and
order he shared the common opinions of the more un-
intelligent thieves; that all men except "working
stiffs” (laborers) were crooked, and that the laborers
were honest merely because they were too timid or
too stupid to be anything else. He would laugh scorn-
fully at any talk of reformation, which he considered
"the bunk” — a brew for weaklings, but not for
master burglars like himself. After serving some six

8i

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
years, Elsmore was released on parole. Two years later,
having continued with his prowling of houses at
night, he was arrested with two accomplices, charged
with a series of crimes. Panic-stricken at the thought
of additional years of imprisonment, and although
there was very little evidence against any of the three,
Elsmore bargained with the district attorney and
agreed to turn state’s evidence in return for compara-
tive immunity. By thus double-crossing his pals he
escaped getting a new sentence and was merely re-
turned to Charlestown as a parole violator. He would
have gotten off scot-free, except for the fact that it
was discovered he had contracted a case of syphilis
while he was at liberty; and so he was kept at Charles-
town for a year, during which he received treatment
for the disease. The marks of syphilis upon his superb
body, to say nothing of its influence on his mind, were
a source of great anguish to Elsmore. So also was the
ostracism he had to endure as a result of having be-
trayed his comrades. Instead of being a "big shot”
this time, he was known as a "rat” and studiously
avoided by right-thinking thieves. He was released in
1928 and remained out of sight for the next four
years, during which he must have committed hun-
dreds of crimes, and perhaps passed his disease on to
numerous unsuspecting girls. In 1932, at the age of
thirty-four, he was shot and killed by a policeman
on whom he had tried to draw a gun when the police-
man tried to arrest him. He had spent ten years of his
life (out of twenty) behind bars, between the ages of
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PRISONER AND REFORMATION
fourteen and thirty-four. Elsmore’s career and per-
sonality and attitude are entirely typical of one kind
of professional criminal.

The Case of Williams

Williams was born in New York (also in 1898) of
German-Scotch parents. He was still a schoolboy
when his father deserted his mother and left the
family to get along as best it could. There were two
younger children, both girls. The Williams family
lived on West 49th Street, between Ninth and Tenth
avenues, in the famous "Hell’s Kitchen” district.
Young Williams was obliged to leave school during his
sixth term in grammar school in order to help sup-
port the family. He sold papers on the streets of the
city, like others from the very poor families, and in
this rough and ready environment became preco-
ciously sophisticated and also extremely adept in the
use of his fists. In his neighborhood the gangster was
the hero whom all the younger boys worshipped; and
it became the ambition of Williams to grow as hard-
boiled and reckless as "Tanner” Smith, "Link”
Mitchell, "Bum” Rodgers, Owen Madden, or any of
the other gangsters in Hell’s Kitchen. In the course of
time he developed into so good a lightweight pugilist
that he was able to add to his slender income by tak-
ing part in bouts staged at the various neighborhood
sporting or recreation clubs sponsored by Tammany
district leaders and patronized largely by gangsters.

8s

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
The district recreation club was the social center for
the slum boys — what the Y. M. C. A. was to their
fellows at a slightly higher level of the social structure.
At the age of fourteen, Williams was as tall and
strong as most boys of sixteen or eighteen; and be-
cause of his fistic powers and general toughness was
soon on terms of intimacy with members of the
notorious Tanner Smith mob, which was then staging
its last fight for control of the district (they lost out
to the equally notorious Madden mob, which still con-
trols that and other districts of the city) . With other
members of the mob, Williams took part in the vari-
ous gangster activities; robbing freight cars, wharves,
warehouses; exacting financial tributes from local
store owners whom they terrorized with threats of
bombing and other atrocities; but mainly in voting il-
legally and terrorizing non-Tammany voters on elec-
tion day; and at other times terrorizing strikers or
their employers (whichever side paid the most), and
fighting with and raiding the headquarters of the
Madden mob. Williams proved a valuable recruit
and was soon as dangerous and skillful with a knife,
club, or gun as he was with his clever fists. Gradually
he began going in with other gangsters for the
more remunerative crimes (pay-roll robberies, safe-
cracking, hold-ups, and the like) ; and before he was
eighteen Williams was "keeping” a girl in a Broadway
apartment and getting initiated into the night life of
the city. His mother and sisters remained at the old
home on West 49th Street, but Williams did not
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PRISONER AND REFORMATION
neglect them. He had long ago dropped even the pre-
tence of legitimate work; but he contributed regularly
and generously to the support of his mother and sisters
and visited them almost daily. Before he was twenty,
Williams had been arrested a dozen times as a suspect
in the various gangster killings and other activities of
the city; but never did he serve a day in prison after
appearing in court. The usual procedure (which the
gangsters themselves preferred to formal arraignment
and trial) was as follows: after a killing or robbery,
the detectives would arrest and bring to headquarters
any gangsters whom they could find, subject them to
an intensive third degree (often beating them un-
mercifully) , and then turn them loose when the beat-
ings had failed to elicit evidence connecting them with
the crime in question. This was all a part of the regu-
lar routine of Williams’s life; and while he took it as
a matter of course, he had seen so much of corruption
among detectives, district attorneys, and even judges
that he came to have a strong hatred for representa-
tives of law and order. Wise to the ways of the under-
world, a shrewd and clever criminal who never
worked except after laying carefully-thought-out
plans, it was not until Williams tried to operate in a
strange city, with gangsters he did not know, that he
got into serious trouble. In 1918, at the age of twenty,
he was asked to come to Boston with three other
gangsters to steal the pay roll of a large corporation.
It was to be the Christmas pay roll, estimated at
$60,000. Through some carelessness of the local tip-

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sters, the information was inaccurate; so that Wil-
liams got only a comparatively small pay roll of
$ij,ooo, in the seizing of which he shot an armed
guard who attempted to draw his gun. Because of the
shooting (although the guard did not die for two
years) and because of the prestige of the corporation,
there was a great hue and cry about the crime. One
of the Boston gangsters was arrested on suspicion.
Fearing a long prison term for himself, he implicated
Williams and three other men. In spite of this, it is
doubtful that Williams could have been convicted.
The books of a New York firm of longshoremen
showed that Williams and his pals had been working
in New York on the day of the robbery! Thus did
Williams plan his crimes before he went to work. But
the man who had implicated him was persuaded to
turn state’s evidence; so, in spite of the efforts of a
former district attorney, who had been paid a retainer
of $3,000 to "fix” the case, Williams and his pals were
given ten- to fifteen-year terms in the state prison
(the crooked ex-district attorney, by the way, was
later disbarred and sent to prison at the time when
two other district attorneys were disbarred and re-
moved from office) . The informer, as it happens, was
killed within a few months.

Williams, as I came to know him in the prison, was
in many ways a fine character. He was entirely reli-
able and honest with his friends, deceitful and treach-
erous with his enemies, and utterly without fear. He
would never steal or harm poor people; he would
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PRISONER AND REFORMATION
select his victims solely from among the moneyed
classes. From one point of view I have always found
certain gangsters to be, on the whole, the very highest
type of criminal. Although there are many hangers-on
of a much lower grade in gang circles, the real gang-
ster is in many ways a fellow who lives strictly up to
a stern though predatory code of his own. I liked
Williams, personally, better than any other criminal
I have ever known. But he was definitely antisocial
in his attitude toward law and order and reformation.
While he would admit the theoretical necessity of
laws and policemen, he had seen so much of corrup-
tion in the ranks of law-enforcement officials that he
knew himself to be no worse than many of these, and
far better than some. He took the cynical attitude.
"What the hell,” he would say. “Everybody’s out for
the money. Get it, long as you don’t have to take it
from some poor bastard that can’t afford to lose it.
But get it. Once you’ve got it, nobody cares how or
where you got it.” When he left prison, therefore,
after serving a little more than nine years, he merely
became more cautious, going in for the bootleg and
night-club racketeering which had developed during
his years in prison. I met him in New York in the
autumn of 1931. We were discussing the state of af-
fairs in regard to unemployment and the slackness in
racketeering profits. “It’s pretty tough,” said Wil-
liams. “I’ve got my apartment and my mother’s home
to keep up. My two sisters are married and their hus-
bands haven’t had work for months. There’s not much

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
money in the rackets, the way things are nowadays.”
I asked him, in view of this, how he was able to keep
up his own establishment and his mother’s and also
help his sisters keep alive during the current depression.
"There’s only one thing to do,” said Williams. "I’m
doing it, and so is almost every one I know. Grab
a gun and go out and steal!” In his various attitudes
and general character, Williams was typical of his kind
of criminal.

The Case of Mills

Mills was born in Alabama in 1900 of German-
Irish parents who were what was locally known as
"white trash.” They lived on a farm near a small vil-
lage. I do not know as much about Mills’ boyhood as
I wish I did; but I do know that for some reason he
did not like his father, but fairly worshipped his
mother. At all events, he began running away from
home at an early age, bumming his way about the
country, stealing when he saw a chance. From the
time he was about sixteen years old he never returned
home except to visit his mother. He first ran afoul of
the law in 1918, in Boston, when he was charged with
the possession of a stolen automobile which he said he
bought from a stranger. He was sent to the State
Reformatory, where he spent two years, and on being
released promptly “jumped” his parole and left the
State. In the reformatory he had met an older man
who had initiated him into the technicalities of for-
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PRISONER AND REFORMATION
gery; and Mills proceeded to pass a series of worthless
checks in stores and banks all over the country. Ar-
rested in Illinois, he was convicted of passing checks to
the total amount of more than twelve thousand dol-
lars and given a term of from one to twelve years in
Joliet Prison. Here he was confined for four years.
When he came out of Joliet he once more jumped his
parole and proceeded to flood the country with bad
checks. He traveled about considerably, spending some
time in Mexico and Europe, and always managed to
associate with the lesser celebrities of the theatrical
and pugilistic world. In 1931, he was arrested, again
in Massachusetts; and at the time of his arrest was
characterized by the Burns Detective agency as "the
champion check passer of the United States.” This
title pleased him very much. From newspaper clip-
pings I gathered that his forgeries since leaving Joliet
had amounted to more than thirty-five thousand dol-
lars (which does not include the proceeds of hundreds
of small checks for the passing of which no warrants
were issued). In many respects I found Mills to be
the typical crook. Uneducated, full of a thousand
ignorant racial, social, religious and other prejudices,
vain as a peacock, utterly selfish in his relations with
other people, he possessed most of the vices and de-
fects and few of the virtues of the average thief. He
was different from the average only in his industry
and financial success. While most ordinary thieves are
lazy. Mills was preeminently the "hustler.” He was
typical of the average ex-convict in the possession in

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
abundant degree of two traits which are characteristic
of nearly all ex-convicts; abnormal sexual activity
and the tendency toward incessant talking. The man
who has served years in a solitary cell has a head full
of vague ideas, emotions, items of information, bits of
self-analysis, which he rarely has a chance to discuss
with any one; and he develops a habit of incessant
talkativeness, a need of continually explaining him-
self to his hearer. In his bags and trunks when ar-
rested Mills had wads and wads of newspaper clip-
pings about himself ; he had dozens of letters, business
cards, hotel bills, telegrams, guest-membership cards,
and other odds and ends of travel souvenirs which he
had scrupulously saved in order to impress his fellow
convicts when he came to prison; he had literally
thousands of photographs of himself, in each of which
he was seen posing proudly beside some noted gang-
ster, lesser movie celebrity, or pugilist; he had a large
assortment of photographs of women in various stages
of undress (from kodak size to great fifteen-by-
thirty-inch pictures) , including a goodly number of
extraordinarily filthy "French” pictures. All his
clothes, accessories, and baggage were of the ultra-
doggy, flashy style. When he came to the county jail
in which I was serving a six months’ sentence. Mills
was placed in the cell next to mine. As I came from
the dining room one day and was passing his barred
door, he thrust a package of cigarettes at me and said,
"Here!” I did not know him; had never heard of him;
and was consequently somewhat surprised. I mur-
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PRISONER AND REFORMATION
mured a hurried "Thanks” and went on to my cell.
The next day he handed me a magazine, saying,
"There’s a piece about me in here.” I read the maga-
zine article about his capture through a photograph
published in a detective magazine, which showed that
his arrest had been due to a girl, an attendant at a
hotel cigar counter, to whom Mills had been ob-
noxiously attentive. She had recognized him from the
magazine photograph, engaged him in conversation,
and tipped off a detective who made the arrest (for
which she earned a reward of five hundred dollars).
The following day when I saw Mills in the yard at
recreation time, he said, "Did you read that piece
about me? It’s a lot of bunk, all except what the
Burns people say about me.” The inference was, of
course, that the unflattering parts of the article were
untrue. He then handed me a sizable batch of news-
paper clippings about himself, clipped chiefly from
small-town and small-city newspapers, in all of which
he had granted interviews in which he made much of
his acquaintance with a certain male movie star and
of his popularity in night-club circles. The same day
he asked me if he might share my cell with me. He
said he hated to be alone in a cell and wanted some
one with whom to talk and play cards. Although I
knew I should be unable to stick his company for
more than a few days, I agreed to share a cell with
him. Frankly, I was completely broke, and glad of a
chance to cell with a moneyed man who could supply
the cigarettes and groceries. But, hard pressed as I was

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
for these items, a single week was all I could endure
of his company. From the time we got up in the
morning until long after lights out, all I would hear
would be “I — me — my — mine — I — I — I —

In spite of the considerable traveling he had done.
Mills was still the small-town yokel trying to impress
the other natives with his sophistication, amatory ad-
ventures, and general dissipation. He was in all his
attitudes and reactions essentially the selfish, con-
ceited, willful “spoilt child.” The faintest sign of dis-
belief on the part of his hearer, the merest hint of a
difference of opinion, sent him into a veritable tan-
trum. He was as vulnerable, in many ways, as a sensi-
tive child of seven. Every time a guard passed the cell.
Mills would give him a cigar (he kept the cell fairly
overflowing with cigars, cigarettes, toilet articles, and
groceries) and engage him in conversation. The ob-
ject was always to secure for himself some item of
special privilege not granted to the average inmate.
He wanted his meals brought up to the cell, for ex-
ample; he wanted permission to have his radio in the
cell; he wanted new shirts and trousers, instead of the
second-hand garments worn by the average inmate.
As soon as the guard had gone out of earshot. Mills
would turn to me and say, “Do you think I can’t kid
these hick screws to death?” He would smile in a
sickening, fatuous way, and add, “Boy, before I leave
here. I’ll have these clowns eating right out of my
hand!” He distributed cigarettes and groceries indis-
criminately among the inmates; paid small fines for

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some; and was known among the recipients generally
as “an 1 8-karat sucker.” It was obvious even to the
more obtuse inmates that his liberality was not
prompted by sympathy or natural generosity, but by
a desire to make a “big shot” of himself. In his every
word and act he was intent chiefly on impressing upon
the rest of us his own importance. I could see that this
was the way he must have paid for the company of
the celebrities of newspaper creation with whom he
associated in the free world; such people are notori-
ously willing to suffer the presence of fools with
money to buy liquor and entertainment. The fact
that he had two years to serve in Massachusetts and
owed several years to Joliet did not seem to bother
Mills. He thought he could probably buy his way out
of serving most of the time; and so long as he had
plenty of money for prison luxuries, and some one to
listen to his bragging, he seemed to be fairly well satis-
fied. In his attitude toward law and order Mills was
distinctly antisocial. He showed no slightest trace of
consciousness of wrong-doing; he had absolutely no
regrets about his criminal career; he spent a great deal
of time discussing possible plans of improving his skill
at forging; his whole attitude was that of a man dis-
easing his chosen profession. His attitude toward life
was that of the rounder; so long as he could bask in
the reflected light of newspaper celebrities, enjoy the
expensive smiles of the more depraved women, have
enough money to wear flashy clothes, drive a flashy
car, eat luxurious foods, drink fairly good liquor, live

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
at gay resort -hotels — he had no desire for anything
more in life. With none but the lowest standard of
values, practically no formal education or training,
with an excessive egotism, not much else could be ex-
pected of him, I told myself. I believe that Mills will
be a professional thief as long as he lives, unless he gets
a sentence, eventually, which will keep him behind
bars for the rest of his life. In most respects. Mills is
typical of the average professional criminal.

The Case of Evers

Evers was born in Kentucky of English-French
parents circa 1880. I know nothing of his early his-
tory except that his parents were fairly well-to-do
planters who were able to send him to college. Shortly
after being graduated from college he came to New
York and secured work in a brokerage office. Two
years later he lost his job on account of having misap-
propriated office funds. He had, however, learned
something about stocks and bonds and their manipu-
lation for profit; and now he proceeded to drift from
one bucket shop to another, acquiring a knowledge of
illegitimate methods of operation. With two associates
he began working the up -state cities and towns, pick-
ing his victims from lists of known stock-market
speculators stolen from former employers. He in-
variably selected as his victims very old, often invalid,
men and women who were unlikely to be able to cause
him active trouble after he had swindled them. His

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PRISONER AND REFORMATION
attitude toward his victims and toward his crimes is
best indicated by his own language. In describing a
swindle, his whole manner was that of a pretendedly
modest man describing some youthful prank which
revealed his own cleverness or courage or sophistica-
tion.

“Steve and I went up to Rochester,” he would say.
"There was an old biddy up there who had a thousand
shares of T. & T. preferred, worth all of thirty dol-
lars a share at current prices. Man, it was a shame the
way we put the old 'swerve’ on her! You’d have
laughed your head off! It was like taking candy from
a baby or kicking the crutches out from under a
cripple! Well, sir; we built her up gradually, and then
we stepped in and clipped her for the thirty grand
worth of stocks. I brought her a thousand shares of
O. & P. common, which I told her was not quite as
good at the moment as T. & T., but was due for at
least a five-point rise within a few weeks. I asked her
to hold my stock as security while I took hers to the
bank to have the registrations verified. Can you
imagine that! Why that O. & P. stock wasn’t worth
three dollars a bale even as waste paper! Anyhow, I
grabbed her stocks and we lammed out of town on the
first train — and she’s still waiting for me to come
back with her T. & T. preferred!” Here Evers would
give vent to a reminiscent chuckle and say, “Can you
imagine anybody being such a sap as that?”

From such beginnings he gradually developed into a
big-time bucket-shop man, with a main office and

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
dozens of salesmen in New York, and clients by the
thousands. In 192J, his firm “failed” for more than
two million dollars, a large portion of which Evers
had secretly tucked away in various safety-deposit
boxes. He spent several hundred thousand dollars
“fixing” the most active complainants, including cer-
tain officers of the law, and succeeded in getting off
with a sentence of only two years. Thus, after swin-
dling thousands of people out of two million dollars,
and wrecking two small-town banks when he crashed,
Evers had to serve a mere eighteen months (six
months offi for good behavior) in prison; and during
that time he literally lived on the fat of the land, en-
joying every item of special privilege and luxury
which money could buy. He used to laugh when even
hard-boiled thieves taunted him about swindling
women and orphans and invalids.

“Hell,” he would say. “If I didn’t clip them, some-
body else would. A sucker is born to be trimmed.
They’ve all got larceny in their hearts, anyhow; or
I’d never be able to swindle them; they’re all looking
for easy money — for something for nothing. I gave
them nothing for something, believe me!”

Vain, self-indulgent, unprincipled, Evers repre-
sents, or so I believe, the professional criminal in his
most dangerous stage of development ; the wrecker of
communities, whose activity is more harmful to the
social structure than the activities of hundreds of
plain gangsters or bank robbers or other types of
criminal. Yet, such is the law that men like Evers
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PRISONER AND REFORMATION
seldom get more than a year or two in prison as pim-
ishment for their crimes. As may be expected, Evers
had no faintest desire for reform.

"I should go to work,” he would say, "with all these
loose dollars fairly begging to be picked up? I should
go to work for forty a week — and a Christmas bonus
— while the big shots ride around in straight-eight
Packards with Follies girls? Don’t make me laugh.
You only live once; and believe me. I’m going to live.”

John Smith

Through the various records made by examiners at
the institutions where Smith has been confined, the
following bare facts could be learned about him. That
he was born in 1910 in the city of New Bedford,
Massachusetts, of an English father and an Irish
mother. That at the age of eight he was committed to
the Lyman School for Boys as a stubborn child. That
while he was there his mother and father separated.
That he was paroled to the custody of a farmer from
whom he ran away. That he was twice returned to the
Lyman School as a parole violator. That at the age of
fourteen he was sent to the State Reformatory. That
he was again paroled to the custody of a farmer and
again ran away. Finally that, at the age of sixteen, he
was sentenced to the State Prison for a term of from
nine to twenty years on pleading guilty to robbery
while armed.

These facts may be gleaned from the oflScial rec-

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
ords. It is my purpose, however, to supplement these
facts with facts not already a matter of record: facts
which are of far greater value to the student of crime
and punis hm ent than the mere dates and place names
to be found in the prison files.

To begin with, the official records do not reveal
why it was that Smith was committed to a juvenile
institution at the age of eight. The family was in poor
circumstances. There were three other children. Smith
suffered from neglect. -He felt lonely, unwanted, his
parents being too deeply concerned about their per-
sonal troubles to give him the attention he needed. At
the age of eight young Smith found a horse and car-
riage standing in the road near his home. He climbed
into the carriage and started the horse running. The
horse ran away with him, finally overturning the car-
riage, injuring Smith about the head, face and body.
For this adventure he was haled into a children’s
court, and some brilliant jurist (perhaps for reasons
which seemed to him soimd) ordered him committed
to the Lyman School!

Smith was a rosy-cheeked, beautiful boy when he
came to the Lyman School. In the institution were
many older boys, some of them nearly twenty-one,
who because of political or other influence managed
to get sent there rather than to the State Reformatory
or elsewhere. Among these were numerous degenerates
(or “wolves”, as they are called). They naturally
singled out Smith because of his physical beauty and
general docility, and made his life miserable for him.

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PRISONER AND REFORMATION
From men among my acquaintances who were there at
the time, I know that Smith resisted the advances of
these wolves, at first; but that in the end, through
sheer helplessness in the face of so much pressure, he
gave way and became an unwilling, passive partici-
pant. At the age of ten, when he was released on
parole, his life had already been polluted by sexual
perversion.

With the first farmer to whose custody he was
paroled. Smith did not get on very well. There was,
of course, a great deal of work to be done. Smith was
not a lazy boy at that time, but he was not overly
robust, and the work left him completely fatigued at
night. With no time to himself except on Sundays,
and no one with whom to amuse himself even on Sun-
days (out there in the quiet country; Smith was
originally a city boy), he soon grew quite desperate
for want of suitable companionship and recreation.
He was a mischievous, fun-loving boy, but his daily
fare was work, nothing but work. Tiring of this, he
ran away.

Back to school he went, when he was caught; and
there followed another period of restraint, made worse
by the continued attentions of the "wolves.” Smith
had been working in the printing shop of the school
and was a bright, intelligent, if somewhat mischievous
pupil. When the time came for him to go out again,
he asked the parole agent to try to find him work at
printing, which he liked, and which would enable him
to live in a city or small town where he might find the

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS

companionship and entertainment which, at that age,
were so necessary for him. To his disgust and disap-
pointment, however, he was sent to another farmer.
This one proved to be worse than the first. He worked
the boy from four in the morning until eight or nine
at night (as did many other farmers who obtained
boys from state institutions in order to avoid having
to pay regular wages to a hired hand) . And to make
conditions wholly intolerable, the farmer’s wife used
to let the dirty dishes pile up during the day, for
Smith to wash before he went to bed. Smith ran away.

On being apprehended, it was decided that he had
outgrown the Lyman School. He was now fourteen
years old! So another capable jurist (no doubt also
with reasons which seemed to him sound) sent the boy
to the State Reformatory, where he was thrown in
with men twice his own age, many of whom should
rightly have been in a state prison, which they con-
tinued to keep out of through political influence.
Again he went to work in the printing shop, at a trade
he enjoyed; and once more he found himself besieged
by the "wolves.” By this time, however, he had be-
come pretty sophisticated. He had learned how to
keep them at a safe distance with persiflage and pre-
tended acquiescence, exactly as a courted girl keeps
at arm’s length her too ardent suitors. At times, of
course, caught unawares, he had to suffer the pollution
of his body at the hands of degenerates, who fought
each other for the chance to get at the boy. The effect
of this sort of thing on Smith’s mind and nervous

lOO

PRISONER AND REFORMATION
system may well be imagined. The degenerates treated
him as if he were a beautiful girl. In his efforts to
placate them. Smith developed many of the manner-
isms and reactions of the teasing professional prosti-
tute and of the spoilt child. Such a fuss was made
over him that it was inevitable that he should become
vain and selfish, taking everything offered him by the
wolves, never giving anything in return if he could
help himself. \(^orse still, he was insulted and sneered
at by his fellow inmates who were not wolves; and this
gave him, as was inescapable, a feeling of being soiled,
degraded, inferior, which made it hard for him to face
those who knew about his situation, and eventually to
face any one at all.

Again he tried to get the parole agent to find him a
job in a printing establishment; and again he was sent
out to work for a farmer. This time, thoroughly dis-
gusted, but having learned something through past
experiences, Smith did not run away. Instead, he saved
up carfare to a certain city, and on a certain day pre-
sented himself at the ofSce of a deputy commissioner
and asked to see some one in authority. After a brief
interval, he was shown into Deputy Commissioner
Blank’s ofSce, where the following conversation took
place:

blank: “Well, my boy, what can I do for you?”
SMITH: “I came in to see you about changing my
place.”

biank: “Why, what’s the matter with it?”
smith: “There’s so much heavy work, and I’m not

lOI

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
very strong; and I never see anybody I know, or have
any fun. There’s nobody to play with around the
neighborhood. I’m all alone, you inight say.”
blank: "Who gave you permission to come in here?”
smith: "No one. I thought — ”

blank: "Never mind what you thought! You know
it’s against the rules for a man to leave his place of
employment without permission. You’ve been out be-
fore. You know that — don’t you?”
smith: "Yes. But — ” '

blank: "Where’d you get the money to come in here
with?”

smith: "I saved up my money.”
blank: "Have you got carfare back?”
smith: "No, I haven’t. You see, I thought you might
be willing to get me a job at printing here. I’m a pretty
good pressman and — ”

blank: "And I suppose you think we’re going to pay
your fare back?”

At this point Blank was called out of the oflSce.
Smith was badly frightened. Blank seemed angry with
him. He would certainly send him back to the farmer;
he might even — yes, he might even send him back
to the reformatory, the hated reformatory, for having
left his place without permission. He certainly acted
as if he meant to do anything except help him get a
better place.

In a sudden panic Smith bolted out of the oflSce and
scurried out of sight like a frightened rabbit. He
walked the streets of the city for several days, care-
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PRISONER AND REFORMATION

fully conserving the few cents he had, sleeping behind
billboards or wherever he could find a spot which
looked safe when darkness fell. Just as he was about to
give up hope of ever getting straightened out, he ran
across three young men (all older than himself, how-
ever) whom he had known at the State Reformatory.
Scarcely daring to believe in what he thought was his
good luck, he accompanied them to an apartment in
which they were living. It was in the "red-light”
district of the city, in a neighborhood full of pimps
and prostitutes, sex perverts of all kinds, kept women,
thieves, drug addicts, and general depravity. One of
the men had a young woman living with him in the
apartment; but somehow they managed to make room
for Smith. Their reasons for inconveniencing them-
selves soon became apparent: and now began a life for
sixteen-year -old Smith which must sound so fantastic
that I hesitate to attempt to describe it. Smith’s com-
panions — let us call them Green, Brown and White
— had been living on their wits (if I may so care-
lessly term their mental acuteness) . They had been
going out on the "racket” known as "hustling fags.”
This is a racket only for very young and good-looking
men. The modus operandi is very simple: one of the
men acts as a lure, attracting the notice of some sex
pervert and pretending to be one himself. He then
lures the pervert into some prearranged position,
where he can be safely beaten and robbed. Green, the
"master mind” of this little mob, wanted Smith as a
lure, knowing that the boy’s freshness and great beauty

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would be Irresistible to the perverts who nightly
haunted the neighborhood. So Smith, having no
scruples (many people, as a matter of fact, consider
the sex pervert perfectly legitimate prey) , became the
lure of the mob, and was soon very successfully luring
“fags” to their financial doom. It was a pretty safe
racket; for the "fags” knew that if they tried to have
the mob arrested, the mob would claim immunity on
the ground that the "fag” had solicited them for im-
moral purposes. But safe as it was, there were, after
ail, only a limited number of clients for the mob in
this neighborhood. Soon the word passed among the
"fags” of the district that the Green mob was "dirt”
— and none but a strange "fag” would allow himself
to be fleeced. In time, therefore, the racket wore out,
and the Green mob had to try something else for a
livelihood. They began going out on hold-ups of small
stores or solitary individuals, armed with aii imitation
gun! In this racket, which he considered a great deal
of a lark. Smith was almost a leader of the mob. He
was utterly fearless (without resorting to drugs, as
did two members of the mob), and also utterly re-
liable, never attempting to cheat his pals of their
shares of the swag. In this way they managed to live
for a few months; but having been suspected by the
police, they were watched, and eventually they were
rounded up and convicted of robbery while armed.
All of them got stiff sentences (ten to fifteen years) ;
the smallest sentence was Smith’s (nine to twenty
years) .

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PRISONER AND REFORMATION

I was in the State Prison when they arrived there —
mere boys, Smith only sixteen, and none of the others
older than twenty-one. Even old-time thieves were
shocked to see such a child as Smith in the prison.
They nicknamed him "Baby- face” at once; and at
once the wolves of the place were after him. As it
happens, Charlestown is a pretty strictly supervised
prison, and so the wolves were at a disadvantage: with-
out the active cooperation of the boy himself, they
could do him no harm. No physical harm, that is. As
for the rest, it can easily be seen that Smith, to say the
very least, was in the worst possible environment for
a boy of his age. The effects of close association with
the most depraved and vicious characters in the State;
the effects of imprisonment upon a boy whose char-
acter was as yet unformed; the effects of sexual star-
vation, under-nourishment, lack of fresh air and
exercise, proper guidance, training, education; — the
effects of prison life upon Smith can well be imagined.
I have asked myself a thousand times as I looked at
him: What on earth could the judge have been think-
ing of who sent this mere child to prison? Is this the
way society treats her charges? Is this the result of all
the work that has been done by serious students of
social problems to prevent needless waste of money
and human material?

Smith is still in the State Prison. He is now twenty-
one years old and is due for parole in another year or
so. His mother died two years ago. What will he be
like when he comes out? What has the prison done to

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
change him from a criminal into a law-abiding
citizen? Smith was in a class I taught in the prison
evening school. I found him intelligent and not in the
least antisocial in his attitudes. I tried to help him as
best I could to study and prepare himself for a decent
life in the free world. I helped him get transferred to
the printing department, where he learned to run a
press and a linotype machine. But what will happen
to him when he comes out — unless society can give
him a job, a home, and proper guidance? Be sure
that unless help is forthcoming. Smith is utterly
lost.

There are, of course, other attitudes among the
professional criminals; but in the main the attitudes
(or general attitude, since it is really only one essential
attitude) of professional criminals are those of Els-
more, Williams, Mills and Evers. There is an occasional
criminal of better than average intelligence, like a man
we may call Arthur Baker. Talking with me one day.
Baker said, "Yes, of course it’s all wrong to steal. But
men with our appetites for luxurious living aren’t
going to go without the things we like when we can
see hundreds of men who are no better, no more intel-
ligent than us, living in luxury, merely through acci-
dents of birth or fortune. Especially after we’ve been
in prison. A man develops so many complexes after
serving, say, five years or more in prison, that he’ll
never be right again. Any of us that have served more
than five years in prison — physically, sexually, emo-
tionally, mentally starved — should be taken out and
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PRISONER AND REFORMATION
shot. That’s the only cure for us. I hate to admit it,
but that seems to me to be the truth.”

The four or five cases discussed here are those of
relatively accomplished criminals. But only to the
extent that they were luckier, or financially more
successful, do they differ from the average. The fact,
moreover, that the professionals constitute only about
fifty per cent, of the group, does not hold out any
especial hope to the penologist. For just as an active
minority in the free world generally molds the current
public opinion of law-abiding society, so does this
active, relatively superior group mold the public opin-
ion of the prison community. They are the celebrities,
the “big shots” of their world. Like their counter-
parts in the free world, they wield a tremendous in-
fluence on the behavior of their associates of lower
degree. For even if most criminals would admit, among
themselves, the folly of crime and the wisdom of con-
formity to law and order, in their conduct they con-
form, or pretend to conform, to the prevailing opinion
of the prison community. Just as "respectable” people
in the free world conform to conventions in which
they do not really believe, simply as a matter of social
expediency, so the majority of prison inmates con-
form to prison and underworld conventions; and thus
it is that the average criminal is hostile to law and
order and to the idea of reformation. And it is for
this reason that the penologist will find it impossible,
or at any rate extremely difficult, to reform the mem-
bers of this group.

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
The unconscious basis of this attitude is, I believe, a
feeling of inferiority. The only reputation, notoriety,
or importance the criminal possesses he has achieved
through his criminal activities. To show a desire for
reformation, therefore, is to admit that he has failed,
that he has been unable to finish the game he has
chosen to play. It is to admit that the reputation he
has won, spurred on by the need to make himself
important in the eyes of his associates, is spurious. The
reaction of the prison herd to an evinced desire for
reformation is revealed by expressions of scorn and
contempt directed at those who express a desire to
“go straight.” (“Losing your nerve, are you?” they
say. Or “I always thought you was yellow!” Or “You
must be getting religion, or something.”) It is dis-
tinctly unflattering and ruffling to the criminal’s ego
to have to admit failure where other men have been
(or have seemed to be) successful. It is, therefore, only
very rarely that the professional crimuial has the
moral courage to reveal any desire he may feel for
reformation, and in so doing lay himself open to the
sneers and jibes of his fellow convicts. Usually he dis-
guises his true feelings by saying, "My record is too
tough. I can’t afford to get arrested again. The next
time I fall they’ll send me away for life.” Or “I’m
not getting religion, or anything; but I’ve had my
belly-full of prison. I’m going out and grab a pick
and shovel and go to work.” (Even if this happens
to be his real intention, it is, unluckily, not so simple
a matter, these days, to find work — even with a pick
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PRISONER AND REFORMATION
and shovel. Something more than a desire for work is
needed nowadays before the ex-convict can find a
job. And before he finds it, the chances are ten to one
that he will have slipped back into the old rut of
stealing. )

This, as I say, is the typical attitude toward law and
order of the professional criminal. He has acquired it
in schools for delinquent boys, in state reformatories,
in city or county jails, in the prisons of other states,
and through contact with other criminals in the out-
side world. Let us now try to determine how and to
what extent this attitude is affected by factors in the
environment of the prison itself.

There are so many factors in the prison environ-
ment which aflfect the convict’s attitude that there
is room only for a bare enumeration of most of them.
There are such physical factors, for example, as anti-
quated buildings; a dirty, dusty recreation yard; un-
sanitary wooden toilet buckets; poor, badly served
food; shabby, ill-fitting clothes; narrow, uncomfort-
able cells; dull surroundings, and the like. There are
such mental and emotional factors as sexual hunger;
worry about the loyalty of wives, mothers, sweet-
hearts, relations and friends in the outside world;
various mental tensions resulting from uncongenial
associations, concern about chances for parole or par-
don; the effects of too much reading of trashy litera-
ture; the inevitable “prison stupor” which follows too
long a period of incarceration. Finally there are such
social factors as visits from the outside world; religious

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
services; work; recreation; and contact with guards,
wardens, and other prison officials and instructors.

The ways in which convicts react to many of these
factors have been described briefly in some of the pre-
ceding chapters. We shall consider here only three of
the most important of these factors which have not
yet been discussed; contact with prison guards and
instructors; contact with the warden; and work.

It is a pretty well-established tenet of modern pe-
nology that work in the prison shops should be of a
vocational nature. Here, again, theory has greatly out-
stripped practice. In spite of all that has been written
and spoken about the need for vocational training in
prison shops, I have seen practically no change in the
administration of prison industries. It is true that in
many prisons an inmate-wage system has been estab-
lished, and this is a step in the right direction; but the
nature of the work itself has not changed. In Auburn
Prison (in 1927) there were no shops in which a man
might learn a trade. In Charlestown Prison at the
present moment there are only two such shops,
capable of accommodating only a very few prisoners.
The reason for this failure to reform the prison in-
dustries in accordance with modern ideas of reform is
that the various prison committees of the state legis-
latures still insist that the prison must be a profit-
making (or at any rate a self-supporting) institution
— which it is not, nevertheless, in eight cases out of
every ten, even under present non-vocational in-
dustries. The result of this is that a man finds it all

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but impossible to learn a trade in prison which he
might follow in the free world. I do not say that
learning a trade is of itself enough to reform a man;
but it is obvious that without a trade or profession to
follow, he will have a desperately hard time earning an
honest living in the free world.

Perhaps the most far-reaching effect of doing dull,
tedious work in a prison shop, year after age-long
year, is that it generates within the prisoner an abso-
lute abhorrence for work as work. He comes to associ-
ate work of any kind with dullness, and to yearn for
an ideal life of complete idleness. One often hears a
man say, *'No more work for me, when I get out. I’ve
done enough work here to last me the rest of my
life.” This state of mind is certainly anything but
promising to the penologist.

We come, finally, to the attitudes of guards and
wardens toward the reformation of the criminals. Of
all the factors in the problem, this is by far the most
important.

In a previous chapter I said that no effort had ever
been made to reform me during the years I have spent
in one prison and another; and that I had never
known of an attempt by prison officials, as a matter of
administrative policy, systematically to reform crimi-
nals. This statement, while essentially true, needs a
word of qualification. For example, although no of-
ficial attempt has ever been made to reform me, I am
glad to be able to say that here and there I have met
a guard or other prison official who was willing to do

III

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
his part, if need were. More than one well-disposed
official has said to me, “Now, for goodness’ sake,
watch your step when you get out, boy. You know
there’s nothing but pain and misery in this kind of a
life. You’ve got ability. You don’t belong here. Go
out and go to work; stop drinking; and in a few
years you’ll be all right.’’ Such words, and the atti-
tudes they reveal, are, I admit, very encouraging to
a man who really wants to reorganize his life. But
after all, they are ifterely words — and, moreover,
only the very rare words of very exceptional officials.
They are merely individual efforts and not the official
efforts of prison authorities. Whenever a guard has
spoken to me in that manner, he has been careful to
get out of earshot of other guards or prisoners.

A great many of the older guards and officials re-
member with regret the days when a convict had to
keep at least twelve paces away from even a guard,
and could speak only when spoken to, and then only
after removing his cap and folding his arms. They feel
that any attempt to improve upon the prison environ-
ment is an unwarranted pampering of the criminal,
whom they rate rather below dogs, and openly sneer
at modern ideas of prison reform. And even among
the younger crop of guards there is an almost universal
acceptance of the existing policy of laissez-faire. The
result of this — and of the average warden’s usual
attitude as previoiisly described — is that nothing is
done toward reforming the prisoner. He is simply let
alone, to rise or fall by his own efforts or lack of effort,

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PRISONER AND REFORMATION
except for rare cases where some prison official takes
a personal interest in some prisoner and tries to help
him rehabilitate himself.

Be sure that the criminal feels this neglect, this
lack of interest in his welfare. It is at least partly
because he is sensitive to neglect, and feels himself un-
wanted and unimportant, that he has become a
criminal; and a continuance of the very factors which
have helped drive him into crime are surely not very
likely to bring about his reformation.

All this, of course, is a long way from the ideal
conditions postulated by modern penologists as neces-
sary for reforming the criminal. Where are the clinical
studies of individual offenders? Where is the treat-
ment based upon such studies? Where are the spe-
cially trained internes who observe and report upon
the daily behavior of the prisoner and act as leaders
and teachers of study groups among the prisoners?
Where are the three types of prisons through which
he shall pass in a re-socializing process — the receiv-
ing prison, for classification and segregation; the ad-
vanced prison, for training in self-government and
self-control; the prison of discharge, where the
prisoner is permitted to live under approximately nor-
mal conditions and a final test made of his ability to
use his liberty properly when released? Where are all
these things? In the minds and books of penologists!
In the papers read before learned societies! Anywhere,
in short, except where they should be — which is in
the prisons of America.

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
I am aware that in New York, Illinois, California,
and at the State Prison Colony at Norfolk, Massa-
chusetts, some effort is being made to incorporate these
ideals into the prison system. I realize, too, that the
fault does not lie with prison commissioners so much
as with timid, politically enslaved governors and legis-
lative bodies. But no matter whose the fault — the
prison continues to be a most abject failure as a social
institution. Until the time comes when all of these
unfavorable conditions have been eliminated, it is
somewhat futile to expect the criminal to pull him-
self up, as it were, by his own boot straps. Of all the
persons on the face of the earth, the criminal is surely
the person least likely to be capable of such a miracle.
His reformation, where it is at all possible, will be
achieved only through a great deal of well-directed
pulling from above; but until such help is made avail-
able, he is no more likely to reform himself than he is
to grow two heads. That he must be reformed, unless
society is to be completely dominated by the criminal
element, is becoming more and more apparent to en-
lightened observers of the current American scene.
At the rate at which progress is at present being re-
ported, however, it is likely — unless a miracle takes
place — that conditions will remain what they are for
a long time to come.

Chapter V

Prison Ethics and Etiquette

In every community there are certain prejudices and
practices, in a word mores, which although they are
largely unwritten, influence not only the behavior of
individuals, but the social health of the whole com-
munity. This is as true in the prison as in any other
social unit.

In prison, for example, it is generally held to be a
social error to talk to a guard or other official, except
in an effort to obtain personal benefit (at the expense
of the State) or to advance the interests of prisoners
as a group. Any inmate seen talking frequently, or
for any length of time, with a prison guard is likely
to be suspected of treachery. Unless he has clearly es-
tablished his reputation for being "right”, he is sure
to be called a "rat” if he persists in such conduct.
There are exceptions, of course. Certain guards are
known to be averse to the use of information turned
in by "rats” (although such guards are as rare as the
proverbial snowballs in hell) . It is not deemed wrong

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
to talk with such guards, who are considered nearly
"right” themselves. Even a man with a reputation for
being "right”, however, so strong is intramural prej-
udice in this matter, generally thinks it wise, after
being seen talking with a guard, to make some sort
of explanation. "I was only trying to build him up
for a change of jobs,” he will say; and if he is a man
who values his prison reputation, he will make it a
point to talk openly and unconcealedly when he has
occasion to talk with, a guard. Any appearance of
stealth is damning. The "rats” (informers), of course,
make it a point never to be seen talking with guards
unless they have already become known as informers,
and have therefore already lost their standing among
their fellow inmates. Even when they have become
generally known as "rats”, however, many of them
continue to be stealthy and furtive in their dealings
with oficials; the theory being that there are always
new men coming into the prison to whom their true
characters are as yet unknown. In some prisons in
which I have served time, informers are pretty harshly
dealt with. In the prisons of New York, for example,
the life of an informer is fraught with danger and
the certainty of eventual sudden death. In Auburn
Prison, in 1926, two Italians came to blows in one of
the shops. Finally they drew their knives, without
which most Latins never travel, even in prison, and
one of the men was pretty badly wounded. Unwise
to prison ways, or perhaps so eager for revenge that
he lost all sense of discretion, the man who had been
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ETHICS AND ETIQUETTE
wovmded went out to court and testified against the
man who had wounded him, with the result that his
opponent received an eight-year sentence for assault
with a dangerous weapon. They were brought back
to the prison the same day and locked into their cells
until it was time for recreation. As the bell rang for
yard, they left their cells and walked down the stairs
and along the corridors toward the yard. The man
who had turned state’s evidence did not even get as
far as to the yard. He was picked up in the cell block
with a nine-inch knife sticking out of his heart; and
the authorities never did find out who his assailant was
— except that it was not the man against whom he
had testified, who was in a different cell block. During
my three-and-one-half years in Auburn I knew of five
other cases where informers or suspected informers
were thus dealt with; and in another prison I actually
saw two men stabbed to death for violation of the
unwritten code of the underworld.

The importance of this underworld custom is not
in the fact that an informer occasionally gets killed.
It is in the fact that through fear of bodily harm and
possible death the inmates are as a rule kept from be-
ing on decent, normal terms with prison guards and
other officials. Unless the guard is himself "right” (in
other words more or less crooked), the prisoner fears
to incur suspicion by being seen talking with him.
Thus the average prisoner, should he feel the urge for
reformation, and the desire for encouragement and
support from the officials, is afraid to seek aid. After

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all, he is a prisoner; he has to spend most of his time
among the other prisoners; and he naturally hesitates
to incur ostracism at the best, and death as a likely
worst, should he depart from the code generally ac-
cepted by the prison herd. This explains why it is that
prison officials, even when they try to help prisoners
to reform, find it so hard under present conditions to
accomplish anything.

This code of conduct has another effect which is
bad for the morale of the prison. Prison guards are
not for the most part educated and intelligent men.
They sense the antagonism of the prisoners and in
most cases react in the natural way. That is, they too
become hostile to their inmate charges. They resent
the hostility of the roughneck type of prisoner and
resent the intellectual superiority of the more intelli-
gent prisoner; and thus a wall of active hatred and
antagonism springs up between guards and inmates.

It goes without saying, of course, that in most
prisons the admirable part of this code is more hon-
ored in the breach than in the observance. Men of
high ideals, men with a personal code which is rigor-
ously lived up to, are infinitely more scarce in prison
than they are anywhere else. In the old days, when a
convict or a criminal was actually a social pariah,
shunned by all respectable people, he was forced into
a group, the code of which he was obliged, at the risk
of death, to live up to. At present, when laws in gen-
eral are broken by nearly every one, the sharp dividing
line between criminals and honest men has broken

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ETHICS AND ETIQUETTE
down, and thus the underworld code has become, like
most religious codes or ethical standards, greatly un-
dermined and weakened. There is, in other words,
very little of that "honor among thieves” of which so
much has been written. Thieves are, for the most part,
pretty treacherous, double-dealing wretches, without
a trace of glamour, and very dilferent from the "gen-
tleman thief”, "Raffles”, and other types beloved of
crime-fiction writers and sentimentalists. The average
convict, as a matter of fact, however loudly he may
assert his adherence to the prison code, usually deems
it proper to violate it if he can do so without getting
caught and if in so doing he can advance his own in-
terests. I have known quite a number of inmates who
were generally believed to be "right”, who were "rats”
under cover for years, and thus secured paroles and
other privileges for themselves through betrayal of
the pals to whom they vociferously pretended to be
loyal. The only criminal who, as a rule, can be ex-
pected to live up to the prison code is the gangster
(and some few high-grade thieves). The gangster is
usually a man who has grown up in a neighborhood
where rigid adherence to the code was a matter of life
and death, so that it is actually a religion with him to
be "right.” If any one questions my use of the word
"religion”, I refer him to John Stuart Mill, who once
stated that, "Any man who fives up to a code of be-
havior based upon ideals which to him seem upright
and fair, has a religion, however warped and mis-
guided it may be.” And any one who has had close

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
'associations with gangsters will understand why I use
the term ’’religion” in speaking of his attitude toward
the underworld code. Most gangsters, it happens,
come from the slum districts of the city, usually from
parents of foreign (including Irish) extraction. Most
of them were brought up in the Catholic faith and
have thus at an early age been impressed with the need
of close adherence to a body of belief which was gen-
erally despised by the majority of the members of the
community (Catholics have always been at a disad-
vantage in the American community, except in the
urban centers) .

Having spent several years in daily contact with
the gangster, I have had ample opportunity for ob-
serving the way in which he lives up to his narrow
code. Without for an instant wishing to glorify him,
or make him glamorous (which he is not) , I never-
theless have to record that he is, of all criminals, the
man who most nearly lives up to a code of conduct
which he believes right (from his twisted point of
view) . I have personally known gangsters who went
to prison for long terms when, by revealing the truth,
they could have shifted the blame where it rightfully
belonged (on other members of the tribe who luckily
evaded arrest). When Mr. Osborne was warden of
Sing Sing, there were thirty-nine executions. Mr. Os-
borne was on unusually close terms with the gang-
sters. They knew him to be trustworthy, a man of
honor, whose word was his bond, never to be violated.
For this reason he was able to learn (confidentially,
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ETHICS AND ETIQUETTE
of course) a great many things which he knew noth-
ing about officially (as warden) . In this way he knew,
for example, of four gangsters who went to their
deaths in the electric chair for crimes they did not
commit. From the gangsters’ point of view, this was
merely "the breaks of the game”, which they accepted
bravely and philosophically. Had other gangsters hap-
pened to get caught in their places, these would also
have been expected to accept their hard fate without
breaking the chief tenet of their faith: “Never squeal!
Death before dishonor.” Such men surely had a reli-
gion and lived it. That is why I consider the gangster
the most high grade of criminals.

As for statements that the gangster is merely a
drug-crazed, cowardly killer, which has been made
chiefly by prejudiced policemen and ignorant fiction-
eers, may I say this: There are, it is true, cowardly
hangers-on in every group, spineless fellows who can
function only as units of a gang and are personally
without courage. These are not, however, true gang-
sters. They are merely the toadies and weaklings who
have always attached themselves to the camps of the
strong. The true gangster is usually anything but
lacking in physical courage. I have seen gangsters
stand up and fight each other with clubs, knives, side-
walk bricks, or anything which happened to be handy,
in rough-and-tumble fights where there were no rules
except that the toughest man would survive. The
gangster will fight fairly only with those he consid-
ers his equals. The fact that in late years gangsters

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
have taken to putting each other "on the spot”, as it
is called, has gained them the reputation of being
cowardly killers who shoot their enemies in the back.
The real gangsters do not resort to this method of kill-
ing through cowardice: it is rather a matter of cau-
tion. For the most part, gang killings are now com-
mitted by hired gunmen, who often have no other
connection with the gang. With them killing is purely
a matter of business — a dangerous business which
must be done quickly and without involving arrest
and execution. The hired killer, therefore, arranges to
have his victim at a certain spot at a certain moment,
when he steps in and finishes the grim business and
dashes off to a prearranged place of safety and an
alibi usually prepared in advance. It is not the fear
of enemy bullets, but the fear of arrest and execution
which makes him do the business thus callously and
expeditiously. For this reason, however, the gangster
has been called a drug-crazed, cowardly killer (al-
though the police, when they go in large numbers to
arrest a gangster, prove that they do not thus lightly
rate his courage or fighting skill) . He is essentially the
killer. He does not, like the average man, merely feel
like punching his enemy into submission; he goes out
to kill or maim when his anger is aroused, and nothing
short of death or unconsciousness will stop him from
fulfilling his ruthless purpose.

It would be interesting to try to trace the connec-
tion between the religious killings of the Spanish and
other religious inquisitores and the gangster killings,
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ETHICS AND ETIQUETTE
such as the notorious St. Valentine’s Day massacre in
Chicago. Those who cry out the loudest that such
events are indicative of unusual depravity in our day,
have apparently forgotten the famous St. Bartholo-
mew’s massacre in France, or the ruthless exploits of
the Spanish conquistadores in Mexico and South
America, or the imperialistic massacres in India,
Africa and elsewhere. Like the gangster killings, these
were merely the ruthless efforts of a class or group to
win domination and power, exactly as the gangster of
to-day is trying to gain power in America (and suc-
ceeding to an alarming degree). There are of course
logical pitfalls in such an analogy; but I believe there
is a very definite connection, could one but trace it.

Prisoners who sing in the choir, teach in the prison
school, or otherwise interest themselves in legitimate
intramural activities (including writing for the prison
magazine) are generally sneered at and despised by
the more "hard-boiled” element within the prison.
Such men generally are called "administrative pricks”
and worse names, and suspected of being informers
and toadies (which, as a matter of fact, many of
them really are) . Any prisoner who has a good word
to say about the food, entertainment, recreation,
work, or any other administrative detail, can expect
to be tagged with such a title, and to be more or less
ostracized by the professional criminal group. There
is, from the prisoners’ point of view, something to be
said for the attitude that "boosting” is treachery to
the community; for conditions in most prisons are

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
admittedly bad, and it certainly does not tend to im-
prove them to have prisoners pretending in the prison
magazine that they are satisfied and happy under
existing conditions. On the contrary; for the prison
authorities do not consider that the men who "boost”
usually do so to advance their own selfish interests, to
curry favor which may bring them privileges or a
parole. In Charlestown, I remember, the inmate pub-
lication {The Mentor) was so purely an administra-
tive organ, and so lamentably failed to represent the
opinions and attitudes of the average prisoner, that
eventually no one would write for it except men who
were almost brazenly of the "booster” type.

The prevailing attitude, at any rate, is that it is
wrong to admit that the prison ofl&cials are right about
anything they do: carping criticism is the order of the
day — although not one inmate in a thousand would
have a worth-while improvement to suggest in place
of the condition he criticizes. He is simply against
everything. "Down with Everything!” is his motto —
so long as it gives him a chance to be in opposition to
his natural enemies, the enforcers of law and order.

Any guard who reports an inmate for smoking
after hours, or for any minor breach of rules, is con-
sidered a wretch of the lowest order. The names such
a guard gets called (under the prisoner’s breath, usu-
ally) are totally unfit to print. The prisoner is a
breaker of laws. The idea that a rule should be obeyed,
not because it is sensible or pleasant, but because it is
the rule, is utterly beyond his understanding. Such
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ETHICS AND ETIQUETTE
rules as forbid him to break out of prison, or to com-
mit murder, he will generally concede to be obeyable;
but all others he feels that he may break whenever he
gets a chance, and thinks it outrageous that he should
be punished when he is caught doing it. Especially is
his anger aroused when he is punished for some of-
fense at which the "screw” did not actually catch
him, but which was reported to the guard by an in-
former. At such times he feels himself a terribly
abused person. When he comes out after several days
of bread and water in the "cooler”, he expects and
usually gets sympathy from his fellows, who also be-
lieve that he has been pretty badly used. If one were
to tell him that he has simply been foolish and stupid
to break rules when he knows that violations mean
punishment, he would be highly insulted and prob-
ably suggest that whoever so admonished him must
be a religious bug or a "Y.M.C.A. pansy.” There is
simply no respect for laws and rules as necessary ad-
jimcts to civilization and social organization. The
prisoner feels that the rules have been made merely in
order to prevent him from doing the things he wants
to do, and thus he resents them very strongly and
breaks them when he can.

The word of a prison guard naturally outweighs
that of a convict — and this gives the guard power
which he quickly learns to employ against the prison-
ers who displease him. They know that whatever the
guard says, when reporting them for violating rules,
will be believed by the warden. It must be believed,

1^5

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
otherwise the whole system of discipline within the
prison is shattered. The minute a prisoner’s wmrd is
taken against that of a guard, the balance of power is
broken; so that even when a warden knows that a
guard is lying, he has no choice except to take the
guard’s word against the prisoner’s (unless, of course,
he is ready to go to the extreme length of discharging
the guard, and even this he cannot do without prov-
ing before a civil-service commission that the guard
has committed a serious breach of faith) . The pris-
oner, knowing that when he is reported he will infal-
libly be punished, and realizing that nothing he says
will carry any weight, invariably lies and exaggerates
in an effort to create friction between guards and
higher ofScials, alleging that the guard is persecuting
him (which may often be the truth, for guards are
anything but backward in taking out personal spite
or dislike on men who have incurred their ill will).
This creates a bad atmosphere in the prison and cer-
tainly does not make for cordial relations between of-
ficials and inmates. It is one of a number of factors
which make for constant friction and discord and
hamper any efforts at reforming criminals. The crux
of it is, of course, that guards and prisoners alike are
for the most part unintelligent, prejudiced individ-
uals, who rarely make allowance for each other’s situ-
ations or aims.

When the average prisoner has an argument or fight
with another inmate, he generally feels called upon to
be as vindictive as possible, considering it a sign of
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ETHICS AND ETIQUETTE
weakness and effeminacy to shake hands afterwards
and make up the peace with his enemy. He will
rarely let the matter drop but will try to arouse the
enmity of all his friends against his latest antagonist.
To do this, he will tell a highly prejudiced story of
the events which led to the quarrel and claim that
everything his enemy says in rebuttal is a lie; and
generally attempt to make his enemy out a "rat” or
a "lousy bastard”, or anything which will result in
his ostracism. There is very little good sportsmanship
or sense of fair play, it being considered the essence
of folly and weakness to give an enemy an even break.
The idea is to win, to gain the advantage — no matter
how.

Although he professes to despise the informer, the
average inmate who is not a gangster thinks it per-
fectly justifiable to inform against an enemy, espe-
cially a prison official. Or if a fellow convict has given
information against him, he usually feels that he is
then justified in doing likewise; the idea that two
wrongs never make a right is too subtle for him.

The average prisoner dislikes the work of the
prison; but he actually hates any work of a menial
kind — such as emptying the slop buckets. Many in-
mates prefer to go to the cooler for ten days of bread
and water, rather than to perform work they consider
beneath their dignity! The fact that it is work which
must be done, and that some one must perform it,
does not make any difference. The usual reaction is:
"What, me empty buckets? I should say not! Who

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
the hell do they think I am; some goddam bum?
They’ll never make me do any of that kind of crap!”

Many inma tes who work in offices, or hold rela-
tively im portant jobs within the prison, become af-
flicted with the "big shot” complex and consider
themselves highly indispensable persons. They are fre-
quently seen strutting about the yard, bragging to
their fellows of their ability, their privileges, and their
general importance in the scheme of things. "Why,”
they will be heard to say, “that so-and-so of a ‘screw’
would be absolutely helpless over there without me!”
I have seen men on intramural jobs, especially when
working in the deputy warden’s office as runner, who
had so exalted an opinion of their capabilities and im-
portance that I doubt if they could ever accustom
themselves to normal positions as relatively unim-
portant persons in the free world. This naturally has
a tremendously bad effect upon their chances of re-
adjustment when they leave prison. Men who have
been minor heroes in the prison world because of
prominence in musical, athletic, or other activities,
often go the same way. There was, I remember, a pris-
oner named Walthour who had a very important
prison job. He was the deputy warden’s clerk. The
deputy warden depended greatly upon Walthour for
information about men who applied for various jobs
and special privileges; and thus Walthour came to
wield a great deal of power. If he recommended a
man for a job, the man invariably got it; and so Wal-
thour became a prison "big shot.” He could walk un-
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ETHICS AND ETIQUETTE
challenged anywhere within the walls and could
obtain for a friend (or for a cash consideration) any-
thing within reason which a prisoner might desire.
The job and the power went to his head; he became
perfectly insufferable, although he was clever enough
not to let the deputy warden see to what extent he
had been influenced by unaccustomed power. When
he was released, after five years of this power, no job
he could obtain in the free world could satisfy him.
In the free world he could be nothing better than a
second-rate clerk. This did not please him nor was it
unrufiling to his inordinate conceit. He threw up one
job after another because he could not bear to be an
ordinary mortal again. He took to stealing, riding
about in a flashy car, pretending to be the same “big
shot” in the free world that he had been in prison.
Skeptical policemen in the town soon began to keep
their eyes on him, and within three months he was
back in prison — where he immediately began angling
for another important position.

In Eastern prisons, with the sole exception of those
in the State of New York, there is little of that
solidarity among prisoners which under the condi-
tions one might expect (and about which so much
drivel has been written) . In New York it is the gang-
sters who preserve the spirit of solidarity in the
prisoner group. I think this will be found true of
every prison in which there is a sizable group of gang-
sters (as in Joliet, Illinois; Jefferson City, Missouri;
San Quentin, California, etc.). For the rest, the

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
prisoners are, as far as my personal experience and ob-
servation go, a pretty shabby lot in that respect. In
Charlestown, for example, there is hardly a trace of
class consciousness or esprit de corps. There are per-
haps fifty or sixty inmates in the population of nine
hundred who have any faintest notion of loyalty to
their kind. I remember several very revealing events,
in this connection. For example, a man was caught
surreptitiously playing checkers in the brush shop.
When haled before the deputy warden for a breach
of shop rules, he said, "The men up in Shoe Four can
play checkers when they get their work done; I don’t
see why I shouldn’t be allowed to do the same down
here in the brush shop.” That this was soimd reason-
ing is beside the point. The point is that he thought
only of himself, of saving himself a few days in the
"cooler” by revealing the fact that his fellows in an-
other shop, under a more broadminded guard, were
permitted a privilege which was denied him. He
cared not that in so doing he would deprive fifty fel-
low prisoners of a petty privilege they had been lucky
enough to obtain. Another incident reveals this tend-
ency even more sharply. Two men planned to make
an escape. During a morning church service at-
tended by only a few inmates (of the Episcopalian
sect) and guarded by a single ofl&cer whom they
planned to over-power, one man was to seize the
guard’s gun and hold the roomful of prisoners in
check while the other man sawed out a steel window
bar which would permit them to escape. Luckily for
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ETHICS AND ETIQUETTE
the guard, his gun was unloaded. As the men assaulted
him, he cried out for help, and told every one that the
gun was unloaded. One of the desperate men, had
already secured the gun, held it against the guard’s
body, and pulled the trigger. When the gun failed to
explode, several prisoners, instead of helping their fel-
lows, as might have been expected, ran to the guard’s
rescue, and at length the two desperadoes were sub-
dued. The thing which I made note of at the time was
that the men who jumped to the rescue of the guard
were not men who had reformed and were sincerely
interested in upholding law and order; they were two
of the most notorious hypocrites in the place, men
who "played” the religious and welfare workers for
all there was in it, and were now aiding the prison
authorities simply because they saw a chance of thus
advancing their own selfish interests, possibly to the
extent of winning paroles or even pardons. As it hap-
pened, however, one of the men was a lifer whose own
father had objected to his getting a pardon; but the
other man obtained a parole within a few months.
. . . Even more illustrative of the lack of class
loyalty is the steady stream of notes which pours daily
into the warden’s oflSce of any prison. In these notes
the prisoners "get even” with personal enemies by
telling tales and generally stirring up envy, jealousy,
and a vast amount of friction.

The average prisoner, despite all that he has seen
of treachery and double-dealing, which ought to teach
him that appearances are often deceitful, seems to

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
have developed little charity. He is very quick to con-
demn a fellow prisoner at the slightest hint of scandal.
A friend of mine, who happened to be very well con-
nected with some crooked politicians, once went out
before a grand jury to testify against a "fence” who
had withheld a large sum of money after disposing of
the proceeds of a jewel robbery. The idea was simply
to force the "fence” to disgorge more money. It was
plain extortion. Through a crooked district attorney
the "fence” had been arrested and the plan was to
have him indicted by the grand jury. There was no
thought of actually bringing him to trial. He was
simply to be scared so that he would contribute a siz-
able sum of money for the "nol-prossing” of the in-
dictment. But the prisoners, of course, did not know
all this. All they knew was that Swain had testified
against some one before the grand jury. At once he
was ostracized by the inmates. That he had all his life
been "right” counted for nothing; that the "fence”
never came to prison, and never even came to trial,
was also of no consequence; and that my friend as-
serted that it was "all in the bag” (this was as far as
he could let the whole group into the secret) made no
difference. To this day he is considered "wrong” by
all but a few intimate friends who were on the "in”
of the story.

It is currently believed by the average prisoner that
all religious and welfare workers who come to the
prison are moral and sexual degenerates of one kind
or another. The reason for this is that occasionally a

ETHICS AND ETIQUETTE
male worker has actually been a sex pervert and oc-
casionally a female worker has proved to be a sex-
starved old maid. Another reason for this belief is to
be found in the activities of the workers themselves.
It seems that they almost invariably select, as deserv-
ing prisoners to help, the most depraved inmates in
the institution. This is not their fault; it is due simply
to the fact that such men appeal so strenuously and
shamelessly for help that the worker can hardly help
but yield to their importunate cries. And since so
many of these men get help, whereas so many decent
men (who hesitate to apply for help) are left un-
aided, this leads to the belief that welfare workers
deliberately select sex perverts as deserving cases. More-
over, the average prisoner, because of vanity and ego-
tism, believes it far more manly to steal than to beg;
and so the prisoner who needs help is afraid to apply
for it lest he incur the scorn of the prison herd, who
would say to him, "Losing your nerve, eh? One of
these Salvation Army bums, huh?” In other words, it
is considered a worse crime to accept legitimate
charity than to steal.

The egocentricity of the average prisoner is re-
vealed in the most startling as well as in the most
amusing ways. It is apparent in his brash loudness of
voice, his pushing forward of himself and his views
at every opportunity. When he is in line, he will
crowd and shove his fellows (unless they are bigger
than he is) ; at the table he will reach impolitely
across his neighbor’s place and grab the biggest or best

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
portions of whatever is in sight; at the table he is in-
considerate and coarse, belching, feeding noisily, and
generally revealing the table manners of a healthy pig.

A friend and myself used to play a little game at
mealtimes in a certain institution: we called it “Dodg-
ing the Inhalers.” There were numerous men who
were noisy, sloppy feeders, especially when there was
soup. There were several who were outrageously noisy
and disgusting. These we called “inhalers” and en-
deavored to stay as far away from them as possible in
the mess hall line. It was usually our bad luck, how-
ever, that while dodging one or two of them, we
would wind up sitting directly across the table from
one or two others! Rather than spoil our days by
yielding to the inclination to go without luncheon,
we would make a burlesque of it and manage to have
some harmless amusement at the expense of the soup
inhalers. We would whisper to them, “What’s the
name of that piece?” Or my friend might say to me
(loudly enough to be heard by the inhaler) : “That
sounds like the allegro strepitoso movement from
‘Poet and Peasant,’ what?”

One could simply sit at the table and watch the
men eating, and learn an embarrassing number of
things about their essential characters. ... I knew a
man who revealed his sense of inferiority (or his
streak of exhibitionism, which is perhaps another side
of the same feeling) by honking loudly whenever he
blew his nose (he was a very small and very gro-
tesquely proportioned man). He also used to bedeck

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ETHICS AND ETIQUETTE
himself with every conceivable item of masculine
adornment: mustache; sleeve garters; leather foun-
tain-pen-and-pencil holder sticking up out of his
pocket; extra buttons on the pockets of his shirt; tor-
toiseshell glasses; he simply wore everything but the
well-known kitchen sink. There was another physical
misfit, a little hunchback, who had a very fine pair
of lungs, and never lost an opportunity of clearing his
throat with a harrrumphl which sounded like the
growl of a giant.

I have wondered a great deal about the connection
between crime and physical ugliness or deformity.
That there is such a connection I have no faintest
doubt. The physically unattractive man is naturaUy
handicapped in the competition for women and sexual
satisfaction. To compensate for this he desires money
with which to bribe or impress the woman he desires.
Unable to get it quickly enough by legitimate means,
he steals it. If this is true of the thief, how much more
so is it true of the raper and the murderer? Because of
physical deformity or ugliness, many men are unable
to secure sexual satisfaction in a sufficient degree and
thus are more or less driven to rape the woman they
desire but cannot otherwise possess. At the bottom of
many murders, too, there is a sexual angle which often
can be traced to physical unattractiveness. Many a
man has killed a woman who would not accept him
because of his physical unattractiveness. And at the
bottom of a great deal of stealing there is the desire
to bribe or impress some greatly desired female.

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
Woman, more than money, is the root of all evil,
from this viewpoint.

As a result of spending so much time alone in the
cell, where he reads, studies, broods, thinks, or indulges
in daydreams and erotic fantasies, the prisoner’s mind
becomes brimful of thoughts, vague ideas, and specu-
lations which he seldom gets time or opportunity to
discuss with any one. He is thus constantly obsessed
with a desire to talk, in order to clear his head of all
that is in it. This results in a tendency toward mono-
logue: the prisoner does not talk with but at his lis-
tener (as a discerning friend once pointed out to
me).

Typical of such men and of this reaction is old Jim
Slater. Jim has served nearly thirty years in prison.
He can recite poetry and doggerel by the ream, he can
give monologues on a number of subjects. When he
joins a group of prisoners he unconsciously begins to
rid his mind of a lot of the vague fancies that are in
it. He is intent on talking, not on conversing, and can
barely conceal his vexation whenever any one else
manages to get a word in. He does not even bother to
listen when any one else speaks; he merely waits until
the interrupter has said a few words and then rudely
goes on with whatever it was he was saying. He will
talk literally by the hour, not very interestingly,
either, but will get very angry if any one tries to steal
the floor from him. It is simply, I suppose, the sub-
conscious desire to compensate himself for the years
of solitude and silence of the cell.

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ETHICS AND ETIQUETTE

This tendency, and also the other mental phase
known as prison stupor, are well illustrated by what I
call the "hanh habit”, which is prevalent to an aston-
ishing degree in prison. When I first began to notice
it, I immediately assumed that deafness was a com-
mon trait among prisoners; for half the time when I
addressed a man he would give me a stupid look and
say "hanh?” But I learned after years of observation
that although the man is not deaf, he has been in a
stupor, absent-minded, so that while he hears you
speak, he does not hear what you say. This having to
repeat my words every other time I spoke got on my
nerves so badly that I became very irritable. It was
extremely trying, even when a man was facing me
and apparently attentive, to have him give me a va-
cant "hanh?” every time I spoke. But at last I saw
that it was another symptom and effect of prison
stupor and lost my irritation about it.

There is a vast amount of dogmatism and intoler-
ance in the average prisoner. Once he has declared an
opinion, no matter how ridiculous he may presently
think it himself, he will abide by it, deeming it a sign
of timidity or cowardice to retract it, or to admit he
was wrong. No matter what proofs are advanced of
his mistakenness, he will usually say, "I don’t give a
damn what you think, or what anybody else thinks; I
know I’m right,” and all the argument in the world
will not make him retract, even when he knows him-
self to be wrong. After encountering this attitude
with monotonous frequency, I made it a rule never

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
to discuss anything (or rather, to argue about any-
thing) except with fellow prisoners whom I had
found to be at least normally intelligent.

The average prisoner is not interested in ideas or in
any abstraction. When he discovers a writer in his
midst, his prayer is, "Don’t forget to write this place
up when you get out. Tell them what a lot of bas-
tards these screws are, and how rotten the chow is,
and all like that.” What he wants presented is not a
true picture of prison life, but a distorted one which
will depict the things he personally does not like. If
he is a natural glutton, the food is what he wants
shown to be unfit for consumption. If he is a lifer, he
wants it known that a life sentence is a long sentence,
imder which a man sutf ers a great deal. It is futile to
point out to him that these facts are not new or origi-
nal, but have been known for hundreds of years by
outsiders. If the writer ignores such trifles as food and
entertainment, and really tries to discuss the signifi-
cant things about prison life, the herd considers him
either pretentiously **high hat”, or an out and out
traitor to the cause. Admittedly the prison environ-
ment is bad and greatly in need of improvement.
Every one knows this. Admittedly, too, the prisoner’s
state of mind, his attitude toward law and order is
bad, and admittedly, too, the prisoner shows very
little inclination to mend his ways — but this is a mat-
ter which he does not care to have discussed. Perhaps
the improvement of the environment will help him to
put himself in a proper mood of contriteness out of

ij8

ETHICS AND ETIQUETTE
which may grow a desire for decent living. An effort
is being made to determine whether or not this is true.
The effort is not organized, except here and there, and
tends to be destroyed by politics and social corrup-
tion, but the great fact is — it exists and gains in a
painfully slow fashion.

139

Chapter VI

*'Men Without Women”

c

OINCE the days of Ancient Greece, and very likely
long before that, students of human behavior have
known that wherever men or women are deprived for
very long of the normal means of sexual satisfaction,
they almost invariably resort to such substitutes as
masturbation, oral copulation, sodomy, and various
bodily and mechanical substitutes. Writing in 1923
('"Prisons and Common Sense”), Thomas Mott Os-
borne said:

"There is another prison problem, understood but sel-
dom mentioned by wardens, which should no longer be
ignored. 'There are two things/ the captain of a great
battleship of our Navy once said to me; 'two things which
I can never handle properly until I can get the cooperation
of my men: Theft and sodomy.’ One of the inevitable re-
sults of a mass of men being thrown together, either in
prison or in the Navy, is the prevalence of unnatural vice;
and if it is hard to control in the Navy it is impossible to
exterminate in a prison. . •

140

“MEN WITHOUT WOMEN”

So far I am in hearty agreement. But when he
states (on page 91) "At first thought it would seem
as though the freedom of the League, by giving addi-
tional opportunities to the more dangerous men,
would increase rather than diminish the evil”, and
then goes on to describe how the League members at
the Naval Prison so well succeeded in wiping out vice
that Portsmouth became known as "the cleanest ship
in the Navy”, I am bound to reply, in the interests of
truth, that in this as in other ways Mr. Osborne was
hoodwinked and deluded by the men he trusted, and
that the Naval Prison under the League regime was
an absolute bawdy house. This, I hasten to say, was al-
most inevitable, and in the earlier quoted remark, that
"vice ... is impossible to exterminate in a prison”,
Osborne came very close to the truth. Conditions did
improve under League guidance; but the improve-
ment consisted chiefly in the public exposition of one
or two clearly moronic degenerates who were trans-
ferred to another institution, and not in any general
revulsion of feeling or attitude on the part of the bulk
of the prison population. ... If sailors and soldiers,
monks and nuns, have been driven by dire physical
and emotional necessity into such abnormalities of be-
havior, is it to be wondered at that the convict has
been driven to the same extreme? For of all the social
units in which the sexes are isolated, the prison is
surely the one in which the isolation is the most com-
plete. The imprisoned man is essentially the man iso-
lated from the woman. It is in this respect that he

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
di£Fcrs most sharply from the man in the free world.
If the imprisoned man endures hardships in the way
of poverty, mal-nourishment, paucity of entertain-
ment, recreation, and the like, so also does the average
man in the free world. But the free man, regardless
of his financial, personal, social and other limitations,
can and does — legally or illegally — have access to
the woman. The imprisoned man is completely and
utterly cut off from her and thus many inmates are
cruelly, remorselessly driven by their unsatisfying en-
vironment into the morass of sexual depravity.

Do you care for the additional testimony of an il-
lustrious prisoner of another day and age? If so, give
careful attention to the poignant words of the author
of the ‘^Ballad of Reading GaoP^

**With bars they blur the goodly sun
And bltir the goodly moon:

And they do well to hide their Hell
For m it things are done
That Son of God, nor Son of Man,

Ever should look upon.

**Each wretched cell in which we dwell
Is a foul and dank latrine:

And the fetid breath of living death
Chokes up each grated screen;

And all, but Lust, is turned to dust
In Humanitys MachmeJ*

The underscoring here is my own; but you may be
sure that these words were as heavily underscored in
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••MEN WITHOUT WOMEN’*
the mind of Oscar Wilde as they are in mine, or in
that of every ex-prisoner. From this point of view,
I am in vigorous accord with George Bernard Shaw,
who once wrote that "Imprisonment as it exists
to-day is a worse crime against the prisoner than any
crime the prisoner commits against society.” For of
all the possible forms of starvation, surely none is
more demoralizing than sexual starvation. If one be-
comes sufficiently hungry or thirsty, one naturally
suffers a great deal; but usually only for a compara-
tively brief time. Relief is always in sight — even if
it come in the desperate form of death. But to be
starved for month after weary month, year after end-
less year, in a place where ••every day is like a year, a
year whose days are long,” for sexual satisfaction
which, in the case of a lifer, may never come, this is
the secret quintessence of human misery. Is it any
wonder, then, that the prisoner should seek relief in
any available form? To the man dying of hunger and
thirst it makes very little difference that the only
available food and water are tainted. Likewise it
makes little or no difference to the average prisoner
that the only available means of sexual satisfaction are
abnormal. It is merely a matter of satisfying as best
he can the hunger which besets him. I mean a hunger
not only for sexual intercourse, but a hunger for the
voice, the touch, the laugh, the tears of Woman; a
hunger for Woman Herself.

It must also be stated, as a matter of truth, that
not all prisons are tainted by sexual abnormality.

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
The county jails, to which men come for short terms,
and where the inmates are more of the circumstantial
than of the true criminal type, are comparatively free
from homosexuality. Some state prisons, where there
is no overcrowding, where inmates have separate cells
and where there is strict supervision, show on the sur-
face, at least, a superficial purity. But everywhere
there is sexual hunger, the longing for the companion-
ship and the body of Woman.

Before going any further, however, it is necessary
to be a bit more specific. For it is not true that all
prison inmates are driven into sexual abnormality. As
in the case of hungry and thirsty men, the degree of
starvation and the lengths to which the starving man
will go to satisfy it depend very much on how long he
has been starving, and also upon his natural capacity.
Clearly, in the case of prison iiunates, the man serv-
ing his first and comparatively short term does not
suffer to the extent that the recidivist, the long-
termer, or the lifer suffers. The middle-aged, the old,
the ill, the feeble prisoner does not hunger for sexual
satisfaction as himgers the young and healthy pris-
oner. Moreover, one man has not the same capacity
or desire for it that another has. The man who, before
coming to prison, has been happily married for years,
or has lived a life in which sexual contacts were fre-
quent and satisfying, suffers more than the man who,
because of personal ugliness, deformity, an unfavor-
able environment, or other cause, has not been able
in the pre-prison years to obtain many, or very satis-
144

"MEN WITHOUT WOMEN"
tying, sexual experiences. All these factors, therefore,
and certain others, must be taken into consideration.

Right here, however, the investigator runs against
an extremely stubborn snag. For although it would
be of value to know exactly how many prison inmates
become victims of sexual starvation, and to exactly
what extent, how may this knowledge be arrived at
when there are not any statistics? Worse yet, it seems
very improbable that such statistics will ever be avail-
able to the investigator. Most prisoners are of the ex-
trovert type, little given to self-analysis or introspec-
tion, so that in spite of the suffering they endure they
are seldom capable of working out in their own minds
the causes and effects of their maladies. Then, too,
the mind of the average prison inmate, like the mind
of the average man in the street, is usually such a con-
glomeration of prejudices, ignorance, and general
chaos, that his interpretation of his own feelings and
reactions would be pretty useless. For the prisoner
with a really good mind is an extreme rarity, all the
master-mind fictions about him to the contrary not-
withstanding. (In a Binet-Simon test given to about
fifteen hundred inmates of Auburn Prison during my
time there, for example, only about fifty prisoners
were rated “superior male adults.”) If he could be per-
suaded, somehow, to reply truthfully to even two or
three questions, the prisoner could be of some value
to the penologist; but for various reasons elsewhere
discussed, he resents and hates anything which re-
motely savors of a test, and generally does all he can

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
to bewilder the examiner with evasion and falsehood.
Except in my own case and in the cases of my fellow
convicts with whom I was on terms of intimate
friendship, I am unable to give any figures which
would be any better than a guess. From my experi-
ence and observation, however, I do not in the least
hesitate to say that no prisoner is entirely unaffected
by sexual starvation; that all adult prisoners suffer
from it in varying degrees of intensity.

Before discussing the effects of the malady, though,
let us ask this important question as to its causes: To
what extent is sexual abnormality caused by the prison
environment and to what extent by tendencies in-
herent in the prisoners themselves?

The facts at my disposal prompt me to reply that
the prison environment, working upon the tendencies
toward homosexuality in the prisoners, is the chief
cause of their abnormal behavior. For, since such ab-
normalities exist even in the normal free community,
the prison environment cannot be held wholly re-
sponsible. It is an equally well-established fact, how-
ever, that such abnormalities exist to a much greater
extent in social units like the prison, in which the
sexes are deprived of free contact with each other.

It is not my purpose, nor am I in the least compe-
tent, to discuss homosexuality in all its intricate
phases. The authorities agree that homosexual tend-
encies do exist in many, if not in all persons; and this
plays a vital part in the rise and increase of abnormal
sexual behavior among prisoners.

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The fundamental question is — To what extent is
the abnormality caused by the individual tendency,
and to what extent by the prison environment? If
pinned down to a specific answer, however, I can be
no more exact than this: The prison environment
plays a greater part than the individual tendency in
creating sexual abnormality.

The following are my reasons for so believing. First
of all, it is as true of prison life as of life in the free
community that herd opinion and behavior greatly
influence the opinion and behavior of the individual.
Now herd opinion and behavior in the free com-
munity are decidedly hostile to radical behavior and
opinion on the part of the individual; whereas herd
opinion and behavior in the prison community are, on
the contrary, distinctly favorable to almost any form
of unsocial behavior or opinion. So that while homo-
sexuality is frowned upon and discouraged in the free
world, in the prison world it is not. As Oscar Wilde,
the greatest and most pathetic of prisoners, wrote,
many years ago:

"The vilest deeds, like poison weeds,

Thrive well in prison air.

It is only what is good in men
That wastes and withers there.”

The average prisoner is preeminently the egotist.
Not necessarily selfish in petty ways, he is in most
essential ways supremely selfish. It is, in fact, princi-
pally this disregard for the personal, property or

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sexual rights of his fellow men which has brought him
to prison. The late Thomas Mott Osborne was fond
of saying that, to the extent with which the criminal
allowed full sway to his own selfish desires, there was
nothing abnormal about his conduct; that respect for
law and order, and not criminality, was the artificial,
acquired trait. It is only natural, therefore, that since
homosexual practices enable the prisoner to obtain
some measure of sexual relief, and thus pander to his
comfort, he has no deep objection to homosexuality
as such. Though he may (and generally does) de-
spise and ridicule those homosexuals who play the pas-
sive (or female) part, he nevertheless avails himself
of the relief they are able to administer to him. Herd
opinion and behavior within the prison community,
therefore, may be said to be distinctly favorable to
the flourishing of sexual abnormality.

It needs to be said, too, that many prison inmates
have been tarred with sexual depravity even before
they come to prison. In juvenile institutions, re-
formatories, protectories, and other places, even in
their home environment, they have been corrupted,
not only by their fellow inmates, but by citizens in
the free world, and even by certain officials who are
paid by the State to act as their mentors and guard-
ians. For homosexuality is certainly not an activity
which is restricted to the prison community.

Granted, then, that the prison environment is gen-
erally favorable to sexual abnormality, and granted
that there come to prison certain individuals already
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tainted and thus likely to taint their fellow prisoners,
let us consider very briefly the specific ways in which
the thing works out in practice.

There is, to begin with, the fact that the prisoner
is almost completely deprived of contact with women.
Except for monthly visits, he rarely sees a woman;
and he certainly does not have the chance, once in a
dozen years, of obtaining sexual intercourse with a
woman. This almost complete lack of the female in
the prison world has a very debasing effect. Woman
is, speaking generally, the civilizing, the refining, the
cleansing agent of the community. Deprived of con-
tact with her, the prisoner inevitably becomes coars-
ened, ill-mannered, lowered in any number of ways.
But the most far-reaching effect of this absence of
woman from the scheme of things is the sexual starva-
tion from which all prisoners suffer in varying degrees
of intensity.

Symptomatic of this condition is the inevitable
trend toward matters of sex in the conversations of
prisoners in shop and yard. No matter on what high
level it begins, it invariably ends in risque anecdotes,
bragging stories of sexual adventures in former days,
intendedly humorous quips about sodomy, oral copu-
lation and masturbation, in which the very quintes-
sence of wit is taken to consist in accusations of sexual
depravity. The oral copulators are variously referred
to as "muzzlers”, "fairies”, "fags”, "pansies”, and the
like; the passive participants in sodomy are called
“pimks”, "gonsds”, "mustard pots”, or even more

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direct physical terms are used. These two types of
homosexuality are generally held in a species of good-
humored contempt. The active participants, on the
other hand, who are known as “wolves”, "jockers”,
“daddies”, etc., are generally looked upon with com-
parative respect, chiefly because their behavior is es-
sentially male; and also because these “wolves” are
usually rough-necks; and the tougher you are in
prison the more you are held in respect by the average
prisoner. The frequent recurrence of these countless
quips and anecdotes based upon sexual depravity in-
dicate to what a great extent the mind of the prisoner
is obsessed with sexual matters. For men do not talk
and joke so frequently or so interestedly about a par-
ticular matter unless it is very much on their minds.
That sexual matters do preoccupy the minds of pris-
oners may perhaps best be indicated by the remark-
able fact that, in twelve years of imprisonment, I
think no day ever passed in which I did not listen,
countless times, to jokes and conversations of this
type.

A paragraph of these wisecracks would portray the
state of mind of the prisoner better than a dozen
pages of roundabout exposition; but even in these
days of free sexual exposition there would follow an
avalanche of censorship. So I can only say that when
a man comes to the shop in the morning looking as if
he had had a bad night, sotto-voce quips in racy terms
inform him that he ought to give up masturbation.

. . . The hunger for Woman is expressed in the most
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extravagant terms; her bodily parts are referred to in
phrases pregnant with sadistic longing. Never, not
even among the English "Tommys” during the War,
have I heard the pungent four-letter words of sex
used with such zest as in the prison. And when a man
is seen giving a fellow convict some candy or a pack-
age of cigarettes, it is considered hmnor of the highest
order to ask, "Is he your 'boy’?” or "You must be
sleeping with him!”

This constant preoccupation with sexual matters,
which is one of the inescapable results of sexual hun-
ger, is an important factor in the prison environment,
as will be seen. When the newly admitted, constitu-
tionally homosexual prisoner finds that he is not
looked upon with the degree of loathing and suspicion
with which he is looked upon in the free community,
and when he realizes that here, in a world of men
without women, is a fertile field for his abnormal ac-
tivities, he naturally avails himself of his opportuni-
ties and thus not only satisfies his own abnormal de-
sires, but also becomes a major factor in bringing out
and strengthening the latent homosexual tendencies
of his new associates. And the more constitutional or
environmentally created homosexuals who come to
prison, the worse it is for the sexual well-being of the
other inmates; for it is infinitely easier for such men
to find willing collaborators in their vices than it is
for the "wolves” to seduce the otherwise normal
young prisoners. These "fairies” and "gonsils”, more-
over, are responsible for a great deal of the ribald jok-

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ing about sexual affairs among inmates. Being as they
are for the most part brazenly effeminate in their ac-
tions and mannerisms, they are the never-failing butts
of the jokers; and since many of them become per-
fect imitations of the female "gold-digger”, they
naturally come in for a vast amount of the badinage
and wise-cracking current among pimps and whores
in the outside world.

There is one other important factor which makes
the prison environment so favorable to sexual deprav-
ity. This results from the fact that convicted crimi-
nals are, of all persons, the ones least likely to have
exercised much control of their sexual appetites in the
years before they came to prison. Years of self-
indulgence certainly do not build up in the prisoner
those powers of self-control and resistance which
would be so valuable to him during his prison life.

So much, at present, for this phase of the subject.
Let us now see how, in a few specific instances, the
environment acts upon the individual prisoner.

Let us take the case of a man whom we will call
Barton. I first met Barton in the Lyman School for
Boys, when we were both about fourteen years old.
At that time, Barton was a pretty rough, tough boy.
He was repeatedly running away, getting into scrapes,
spending most of his time in the disciplinary cottage
and getting what we called "slugged” (that is,
whipped on the bare buttocks, with a piece of rubber
hose, by a very strong official) . Barton and I ran away
twice together, were caught, spent several months in
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the disciplinary cottage, and thus became pretty good
friends. At this time Barton was a perfectly normal
boy, sexually. Of this I am as certain as I am that
to-day is Wednesday (in Massachusetts) .... About
ten years later I met Barton in the State Prison at
Charlestown, Massachusetts, where he was serving a
long term (ten to fifteen years) for robbery. He re-
membered me and soon we were again the most inti-
mate of friends. Well, as I began to see more and
more of Barton in the shop and in the yard, I noticed
a vast difference in him. He was certainly not the
Barton I had known as a boy. Gone was the rowdyish
toughness, the coarse language, the rebellious spirit.
No longer was he the eternal trouble-maker who
spent most of his time being punished. He had be-
come a very well-behaved, gentle, almost effeminate
creature. Soon I began to suspect that something was
wrong. Eventually, bit by bit, through a remembered
gesture or bit of conversation, and at length by direct
questioning, I learned the truth about Barton. It de-
veloped that Barton, during the third year of his im-
prisonment, had gone homosexual. He tried to tell me
how it happened. Deprived as he was of female com-
panionship, he had unconsciously begun to center his
affections in a young lad of nineteen who worked
near him in the shoe shop. At first they had been
merely good friends; later they had become insepar-
able pals; at last Barton discovered, much to his sur-
prise and dismay, that he was thinking of his pal in
exactly the same way in which formerly he had

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thought about the girl with whom he happened to be
in love. One day he happened to see his friend naked
in the shower room and thereafter he was to all in-
tents and purposes “in love” with him. The yoimger
man became the object about which revolved all his
sexual fantasies and he definitely longed for sexual
contact with him — although he had no idea as to
what form the contact would take. Hitherto, in the
masturbations in which Barton (like most prisoners)
had indulged, he had always concentrated on the re-
membered vision of some girl with whom he had slept
before he came to prison. Heretofore his cravings had
always been for normal sexual intercourse. Now,
however, he yearned constantly for sexual intimacy,
in whatever form it might take, with his young
friend.

Barton was pathetically eager to make me under-
stand that his decline into homosexuality was totally
unpremeditated. It was simply, it seemed to me, the
result of the action of the environment upon his in-
herent tendencies. The shock of discovering that he
had become homosexual completely changed his
whole character. He gradually developed an intense
feeling of inferiority. And although he managed to
conceal the change from all but his most intimate
friends, it hurt him in a hxmdred irreparable ways.
He lost his very self-confidence, which had always
been one of his most pronounced traits. For, unlike
the constitutional homosexual, the environmentally
created one is usually unable to escape from the

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stigma which he feels attaches to abnormal behavior
in the minds of decent people and suffers consider-
ably from the fear that his associates may learn the
truth about him. . . . During several years, after his
first friend had gone out, Barton celled with six or
eight other inmates for longer or shorter periods. He
told me that most of them, even those who professed
to entertain the most violent prejudices towards
homosexuality, eventually participated with him in
some form of abnormal sexual activity. Thus, Barton,
having himself gone homosexual, was instrumental in
leading other men down the same dark road. From
conversations with Barton and many other men I
knew, who lived in the cell block where two men
could cell together, I learned that sexual abnormalities
were anything but uncommon there. And from my
observations of life in the army and navy, in juvenile
institutions, in the Naval Prison, I realized how this
must almost infallibly be true. . . . Barton was still
in the prison when I was released and had become so
thoroughly steeped in homosexuality that I doubt if
he will ever go back to normal sexual intercourse. A
bit of wreckage from the sea of crime, he will be
washed up on the shores of some community whose
waters he will help to pollute.

Let us next take the case of a man named Baker.
When he came to the State Prison he was already a
homosexual. Whether or not the officials knew this at
the time of his admission, I do not know; but within a
few days of his arrival they must have been deaf,

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dumb and blind not to have become avrare of the
fact. Baker was the most brazenly active homosexual
I have ever seen. In the shop, in the shower room, in
obscme corners of the yard, wherever there was the
faintest chance to indtilge. Baker eagerly availed him-
self of it. In the clothing shop, where he worked, he
made assignations in the toilet with any and all in-
mates who cared to accept them. He took on all
comers, without regard to color or creed. I am con-
vinced that, so brazen was he, he would willingly
have given an exhibition in the prison chapel, could
he have obtained permission to do so. Yet, in spite of
his notorious behavior, what did the prison authorities
do? Did they transfer him to some institution for the
care of abnormal persons? They did not. He was
simply a joke to most of them, just as he was to most
of the prisoners. If they caught him in flagrante
dilecto, he was sent to the "block” for a few days of
bread and water (which is exactly the same punish-
ment which is meted out for smoking after hours and
other minor ofEenses) . Meanwhile Baker kept on with
his abnormal behavior, very harmfully influencing
the lives of the other inmates. As a result of his bad
record in prison, however, he was made to serve the
full maximum of his term, which was five years.
Toward the end of his term — but more because of
insolence to officers than because of his homosexual
activities — he was kept under fairly close guard most
of the time. . . . Now before and during his term in
the State Prison, Baker, although a homosexual, had
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never been viciously inclined. But within a few
months after his release, and almost as if he had gone
out of prison with the sole purpose of securing some
insane form of revenge, he committed two of the
most vicious sexual crimes ever committed in the
state. . . . For these crimes he was sent back to
Charlestown with a long sentence. And even now, in
spite of all this knowledge about the man’s state of
mind, he has not been transferred to an insane asylum,
although he is serving his present sentence in solitary
confinement.

Baker’s case shows to what monstrosities of con-
duct even the constitutional homosexual may be
driven by sexual starvation and its after effects. It is,
of course, an extreme case — but chiefly so in that
Baker’s post-prison activities resulted in the death of
his victims. More than one ex-convict has been driven
to rape when in the free community he found it im-
possible to secure sexual gratification quickly enough
in legal ways. But let us take a case which, Uke Bar-
ton’s is more typical of the prison homosexualist.
Take the case of a man named Dreegan, who is still
serving time in Auburn Prison (New York) . During
my time there, Dreegan was the outstanding example
of the prison "wolf.” Now the "wolf” (active
sodomist) , as I have hinted before, is not considered
by the average inmate to be "queer” in the sense that
the oral copulist, male or female, is so considered.
While his conduct is felt to be in some measure de-
praved, it is conduct which many a prisoner knows

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that he himself might resort to under certain special
conditions (that is, if the average prisoner can find a
good-looking boy, and the opportunity, and is suf-
ficiently "hard up” for sexual satisfaction, he will not
usually disdain to make use of him for purposes of
relief). Aside from masturbation, which likewise is
not considered "queer” conduct, active homosexuality
is the form of sexual abnormality which meets with
the least disapproval from the average prisoner, and
the form he is most Ukely to resort to himself when-
ever he feels hard-pressed enough. Dreegan, then, was
the champion "wolf” of Auburn Prison. Except that
the object of his affections was a boy instead of a girl,
his behavior was exactly like that of a normal free
man toward a woman. Now, whereas most "wolves”
have the grace to be more or less discreet in their
activity, Dreegan was quite frankly what he was. He
went boldly after any young and good-looking in-
mate whom it was his desire to seduce. That he got a
punch in the eye for his pains every so often, and was
more than once knifed by boys defending themselves
from his vigorous assaults did not disturb Dreegan
for very long. He outrageously flattered the objects
of his lust; he gave them cigarettes, candy, money, or
whatever else he possessed which might serve to break
down their powers of resistance; and otherwise
"courted” them exactly as a normal man "courts” a
woman. Once the boy had been seduced, if he proved
satisfactory, Dreegan would go the whole hog, like a
Wall Street broker with a Broadway chorus-girl
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"MEN WITHOUT WOMEN’*
mistress, and squander all of his possessions on the boy
of the moment. In this Dreegan was different from
the average "wolf” only in the brazen directness of
his conduct. Most prison "wolves” are afraid of be-
coming known as "suckers” — a term of great op-
probrium among men who pride themselves on their
fancied sophistication and on their ability to fleece
"suckers.” Like most "wolves” too, Dreegan was
polygamous. No boy could keep up his interest for
very long. One very dangerous possible effect of activi-
ties like Dreegan’s occurs to me as I remember an
incident which happened in Auburn. A young boy
came down from the hospital one afternoon and
wandered into a room where six or eight other in-
mates were smoking and talking. He was known to
be a "gonsil.” Several of those present, including
Dreegan, had had connections with him. They asked
him, half banteringly, where he had been, hinting
that he had probably been out getting "stayed with”
somewhere. He said, "No, I just came from the hospi-
tal,” and after a pause, "What does four-plus mean,
anyhow?” As may be imagined, those present stared
at him, too horrified to speak. Could it be that this
innocent-looking boy with whom they had had con-
tacts was a syphilitic? It turned out that he was; and of
course he was let severely alone after that. Meanwhile,
Dreegan remains in Auburn Prison, where he is serv-
ing two consecutive and very long terms. He is
known by most inmates, and also by most officials,
to be a "wolf” — but there is very little likelihood

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that he will be isolated or transferred to another
institution.

The constitutional homosexual of the "fairy” type is
not a rare bird in prison. In three prisons where I
have served time, there have been anywhere from
a dozen to a hundred of the brazen type, who were
generally known in their true characters. How many
there were of the discreet, "under-cover” type, it is of
course impossible to know. Needless to say, wherever
they are to be found, they constitute a very grave
menace to the morale of the prison. There are, too,
other types of sexually abnormal behavior, such as
exhibitionism, and the like. These, however, since
they are very well understood, and after all are of
minor consequence in the present discussion, we need
not pause to investigate here.

Having shown, however, briefly and summarily,
that because of (a) lack of self-control and years of
self-indulgence in the pre-prison years on the part of
the convict, and (b) because of the presence within
the prison of constitutional and environmentally
created homosexuals who spread their virus among
the other inmates, and (c) because herd opinion and
behavior within the prison are distinctly favorable to
unsocial opinion and behavior in general, and (d)
because, finally, the prisoners all suffer in varying de-
grees of intensity from sexual starvation — having
shown, in a word, that the prison environment is dis-
tinctly favorable to the rise and growth of sexual
abnormalities among the prisoners — let us ascertain,
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"MEN WITHOUT WOMEN"
if we can, the extent to which these things affect the
lives of the prisoners after their release from prison,
and thus also affect the welfare of the social organism
as a whole.

It may be said, without mentioning specific names
and cases, that this depends largely upon the indi-
vidual ex-prisoner and upon the type of environment
in which he finds himself after coming out of prison.
In the case of men who have served only one term
(not longer, say, than five years), and whose only
sexual vice in prison has been occasional masturba-
tion, an eventual readjustment will be successfully
made. For a time, perhaps forever, depending greatly
upon his post-prison sexual experiences, the average
ex-prisoner will be extremely sex-conscious (or "girl-
crazy,” as it is commonly called). The "gonsil” is a
far more difficult problem. He is never a strong
character and is very often feeble-minded. Moreover,
having been pampered and spoiled by the prison
"wolves” until he has developed most of the predatory
instincts of the hard-boiled female prostitute, he is
likely to come out of prison feeling that the world
owes him a living. And as he is usually a pretty lazy,
ambitionless fellow, he generally heads for the nearest
large city and looks about in an effort to find some
ex-convict "wolf” who will "keep” him, or at the
worst help him to sustain himself. Failing this, he
will drift about until he establishes contact with other
homosexuals, occasionally resorting to the sneaky
types of crime which require very little brain work or

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
courage. Thus spreading his depraved habits among
persons he meets, and it may be, infecting them at
the same time with the diseases he may have con-
tracted himself, he constitutes a grave menace to the
community which harbors him.

In a way it is to be expected that the sexual vices
contracted in prison are not to be easily nor quickly
stamped out. The ex-convict, much as society may
pride itself on its present state of enlightenment, can-
not escape from the stigma which still goes with his
title. Unless he returns to his former haunts and
friends (if these still exist), the ex-prisoner is sure
to feel very much out of place, at first, in no matter
what surroundings he finds himself. The sudden
change from imprisonment to liberty, for which he
has waited for so long, has a very heady effect. The
man is botmd to feel very much like a squirrel newly
out of a cage — and to be inclined to act like one
too. This makes for great mental and emotional tense-
ness. He is, on the other hand, very conscious of being
(because of his imprisonment) different from his
fellow men, and extremely aware of a sense of inner
coarseness which results from the long contact with a
coarse environment and consciousness of his own
lapses into sexual abnormality. As the natural effect
of such a state of mind, he feels very much the out-
cast. Feeling this way he finds it very awkward, no
matter how intensely he longs for normal sexual in-
tercourse, to approach a woman. He feels that he is
older, less presentable than he was before he went to
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prison; that he is "dated”; that he has not the cur-
rent "line”, the latest dance steps, the current small
talk about events and people, which used to be so
helpful in the old days; that he is, therefore, infinitely
less attractive to women. Thus arises a diffidence, a
lack of self-confidence, which makes it excessively
difficult for the ex-prisoner to go about getting sexual
satisfaction in the normal, legal or semi-legal ways.
And so he is extremely likely, under very unfavorable
conditions, to fall back upon his prison vices, or even
to go in for rape.

I know several men who resorted to homosexuality
for relief while in prison, but successfully made the
readjustment to normal sexual intercourse when they
were released. I know others who became absolute
satyrs and went in for perverted sexual conduct with
women after their release. This tendency toward
satyriasis, which is very common among imprisoned
men, is one of the worst results of sexual starvation.
As one man said to me, "I don’t give a damn who
knows it — that is, among friends — because I don’t
see where I’m to blame. ... It certainly isn’t my.
fault. ... I simply can’t help myself. Keep a man
hungry and thirsty long enough, and it’s a miracle
if he doesn’t fairly strangle himself trying to tuck
away food and water the first time he gets a chance.
Well I’m the same way about women. I suppose it’s
a form of madness — but there it is, and I can’t help
it. The minute I get near a woman, any woman, all
I think about is whether or not I could possibly

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"make” her, and when I get a woman, I have to
hang on to myself for dear life. I simply go insane
with rapture, and have to be almost thrown out the
next morning, so hard is it to leave of my own ac-
cord. It seems as if I’ll never get caught up on it;
as if each woman I manage to get may be the last;
and so I’m like a starved cat with a piece of fish —
I’m simply not human!” Something like this, in
greater or less degree, is the effect upon nearly every
inmate of sexual hunger.

There is another result of, not necessarily abnormal
sexual behavior, but of contact with it, which has a
dangerous effect upon the prisoner during and after
the prison years. Take the case of the young man who
comes to prison for the first time. Although he has
consorted with thieves and underworld characters
outside the walls, he is comparatively ignorant of
abnormal sexual conditions. Even if he is not particu-
larly attractive, his mere youth is enough to interest
the prison "wolves” and other perverts. He is im-
mediately besieged by a barrage of unwelcome and
exceedingly embarrassing attentions. The more he re-
sists (and he naturally resists, being a sexually normal
young man) , the more they go after him. The other
inmates, even the sexually normal ones, with the de-
praved humor characteristic of prison life, take a
brutal delight in taunting, accusing, laughing at, and
otherwise ridiculing him. As a result of this treat-
ment, unless he has an unusually strong character, the
inexperienced young prisoner is almost certain to
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"MEN WITHOUT WOMEN"
develop any number of inhibitions and complexes
which may, and usually do, greatly hamper him in his
future life. The effect of it is very like what the effect
might be on a young girl thrown suddenly in among
a crowd of hard-boiled whores. And the effects and
after-effects of years of this sort of thing can hardly
fail to be tragic.

There are other ways, not capable of indication, in
which the sexual hunger is appeased. The ingenuity
of imprisoned men in making cynical, satirical, truly
obscene substitutes for woman, is truly incredible.

This, then, is one of the most harmful effects of
prison life, this sexual starvation. How it is to be
eliminated from the prison environment I do not
know, since in the present state of public enlighten-
ment it is unlikely that the prisoner will ever be
given a chance to live anything like a normal sexual
life.

The prisoner’s attitude toward woman is all im-
portant to the discussion. His attitude, not merely
toward woman as the normal means of sexual satis-
faction, but woman as the ideal; as the central figure
in the man’s dream of a home, social position, and
perfect companionship throughout life. It may be
said that in this respect the average prisoner is very
much like his fellow man in the free world; that is,
this man feels one way about it, and that man an-
other. To one prisoner, woman is a mere slut, a peri-
odical bodily necessity, like food or water; to an-
other, the thought of woman is that of the prison

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS

Rather does he think of woman the appeaser of
desire, woman the vessel of joy, woman the natural
mate of man. Nor is it merely of the bodily contact
that he thinks, avidly as he does look forward to that.
Woman is the symbol, as well, of the happiness for
which he longs and expects to achieve largely through
her. . . . Thus she becomes woman the divinity to
be worshipped:

*‘A crystal chalice full of ruby wine
And stricken through with sunlight could not be
More wonderfully radiant than she,

Nor with such luminous enchantment shine.”

This is woman as the prisoners hunger for her in
the lonely watches of the night, when sleep will not
come, when the pangs of sexual starvation drive them
to deeds for which they feel the need of blushing in
the cold, accusing light of morning. Then it is that
they most sharply feel the nameless yearnings of un-
mated animals; then it is that they are most likely to
know the fearfulness of being men without
women. . . .

In the way of suggesting remedies for these injuri-
ous features of the prison environment, I am afraid
that I have very little to offer. One thing is certain;
known homosexuals must be weeded out and segre-
gated. Men must be given the recreation (preferably
good physical exercise to be followed by bathing) and
entertainment with which to make the present at-
tractive enough so that there will be less need of

i68

"MEN WITHOUT WOMEN"
escape-mechanisms like daydreams and "prison stu-
por.” In certain parts of the world, or so I have read,^
after the prisoner has served a certain number of
years, he is permitted to colonize in a guarded area
where he may live a normal sexual life (as in Salva-
dor, and, I believe, the Bilibid Prison Colony). I
earnestly recommend this as, on the whole, the best
remedy for sexually abnormal conditions and be-
havior in American prisons. In the meantime, only a
very intelligent warden who is sufficiently a real per-
son to win the complete confidence of the inmates,
can make any headway against present conditions.
For in the long run, the prisoners themselves are the
only ones who can work out the solution of the
problem. There is very little likelihood of their doing
so at the present time, however, thanks to the type of
warden and guard which predominates in our prisons.
There is, therefore, very little probability that in the
immediate future very much will be done, or even
attempted, to improve conditions which, in nine cases
out of ten, the prison officials will refuse to admit
even exist.

^See the Midmonthly Survey, issue of May 15, 1932, for
editorial comment on improved conditions, in this respect, in the
prisons of Salvador.

169

Chapter VII

Drugs and the Criminal

On no subject with which I am familiar have I
read so much sheer drivel as on the subject of drugs
and drug addiction, especially among criminals. In
magazines, newspapers and novels I have read stories,
often written by fairly reputable authors, which re-
vealed so much prejudice and so little knowledge of
the true facts as to be nothing more than burlesques.
I have also read articles written by Federal narcotic
agents and other "experts” which were so thoroughly
crammed full of pure ignorance and downright non-
sense that they aroused the unstinted hilarity and
scorn of experienced drug-users to whom I showed
them. This is only what is to be expected, of course,
when specialists try to express authoritative opinions
on subjects which lie beyond their special fields of
knowledge and experience. For the writer, as such, is
a specialist only in the art of writing; and the narcotic
agent, as such, is a specialist only in tracing the ship-
ment, distribution, possession, sale and use of habit-
forming drugs, and in locating and apprehending
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DRUGS AND THE CRIMINAL
violators of the narcotic laws. Without special medi-
cal knowledge, or personal experience in using drugs,
neither the writer nor the narcotic agent is any better
qualified to express an authoritative opinion about
drugs and the psychology of drug addicts than I am
to write a dissertation on the anatomical peculiarities
of the centipede. It is this kind of "expert”, neverthe-
less, who is responsible for most of the prejudices and
fallacies about drugs and drug addiction which now
exist in the popular mind.

After this somewhat snooty beginning, it is perhaps
best to insist, here and now, that I do not pretend
to be an expert on drugs or drug addiction. There are
various drugs which I have never tried. There are
various types of addict which I have never run across.
I have, however, experimented with habit-forming
drugs since I was eighteen years old (I am now thirty-
four), and only three years ago I was so firmly ad-
dicted to the use of morphia that I seriously jeopard-
ized my health and sanity and suffered tortures
which I can never hope to describe, before I was able
to fight my way back to drugless living. I have, more-
over, spent most of the past twelve years in prisons
and other places of detention. Since, therefore, I plan
to discuss only drug addiction among criminals, and
mean to confine myself exclusively to those phases of
the subject which I have either experienced myself or
seen with my own eyes, I believe that what little I do
have to say ought to carry some authority. It will, at
any rate, have the merit of being true.

X71

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS

Let me begin, then, by examining some of the fal-
lacies which the "experts” have already established in
the minds of the general reader. One of these is to
the effect that the drug addict is in most cases a
criminal, and that the criminal is in most cases a drug
addict.

Now this statement is more than merely untrue.
It is the most mischievous kind of untruth; for it
contains just enough semblance of truth to make it
generally acceptable to the average reader. The actual
truth is that the genuine drug addict is very rarely a
true criminal and that the true criminal is only in-
cidentally a drug user.

Since this statement is so greatly at variance with
what is commonly thought to be the truth, let me
explain just what I mean. All persons who violate the
laws of a community are criminals, of course, since
the word "criminal” means, essentially, "law breaker.”
In that strict interpretation of the thing, all violators
of the prohibition laws, all breakers of the auto-
mobile laws, and all who break any law of any kind,
are also criminals. To the extent, then, that all these
persons are criminals, the drug user is also a criminal.
But — no more so than the others. No one but a very
conventional-minded person thinks of the violators
of prohibition and automobile laws as criminals; and
only the ignorant notion that the use of habit-
forming drugs indicates inherent depravity in the
user makes the average person think of the drug user
as such.

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DRUGS AND THE CRIMINAL

My experience and observation tell me that the
genuine drug addict, as distinct from the occasional
user of drugs or the well-to-do addict,^ is a person
whose whole life revolves about the drug to which he
is addicted. He is not, like the addict of means, a per-
son who leads a normal, law-abiding life, using drugs
in place of alcoholic or other stimulants; nor is he like
the occasional drug user who goes on a periodic drug
spree; he differs from these types in that he is es-
sentially the merchant. He buys drugs and sells them
for a profit by means of which he supports his own
drug habit. His is a vicious circle of irrational ac-
tivity; for he sells drugs in order to sustain life, and
then uses drugs in order to escape from life. There is,
however, nothing essentially criminal about his ac-
tivity. True crime consists in theft, rape, murder,
arson, and the like; in ruthless violation of the per-
sonal, property and sexual rights of other persons,
and not in mere violations of local (and not neces-
sarily morally sound) statutes and regulations. Be-
cause, then, the true drug addict is essentially a mere
vendor of prohibited merchandise (like the bootleg-
ger), and not, like the murderer, the taper, or the
thief, a true criminal, I say that the true drug addict
is only incidentally a criminal.

It is true, at the same time, that the drug addict
sometimes resorts to true crime. There are times

In this connection see a very good article, "The Real Narcotic
Addict,” in the January, 1932, issue of The American Mercury,
by Fishman and Perlman.

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
when, because of unusual activity on the part of
narcotic agents, he does not dare to ply his usual trade.
At such times he is likely, temporarily, to commit
the pettier types of crime in order to get the money
with which to support his drug habit. Even at such
times, however, he rarely goes in for crimes like mur-
der, robbery, or rape. There is a very good reason why
he abstains from these serious crimes. As the true
drug addict’s whole, life revolves about some drug, he
cannot bear to be without it. It is not only incon-
venient but highly expensive to support a prolonged
drug habit in prison. So the drug addict, when he does
go in for crime, goes in usually for such crimes as
sneak-thievery, pimping, shop-lifting, and various
.similar crimes. When convicted of those he can be
pretty sure to get nothing worse than a few months
in some city or county jail, where drugs are usually
plentiful and inexpensive. This criminal activity,
however, is only incidental, and so does not give a
true indication of the actual truth about the genuine
addict and his pursuits. In the main, it will be found
that he is only occasionally and incidentally a crimi-
nal.

So much, just now, for the typical drug addict. Let
ris now consider the other half of my statement; that
the criminal is only incidentally a drug addict. In
the first place, since otherwise law-abiding members
of the free community also use drugs, it cannot be
«^ id that the use of drugs is an essential part of crimi-

174

DRUGS AND THE CRIMINAL
nality. It is as true of the criminal as it is true of the
law-abiding citizen, that the persons who go in for
the use of habit-forming drugs are usually those who
are improperly adjusted to their environments. It is
the mentally, physically, emotionally maladjusted
individual, the individual who seeks escape from the
harsh realities of life, who goes in most assiduously
for the use of drugs. This means that only to the
extent that he is more maladjusted to his environment
is the criminal more likely than the law-abiding
citizen to resort to drugs.

A great deal of the misapprehension which exists
on this score is due to the writers of tabloid and the
cheaper grades of detective fiction. From the fact that
an occasional spectacular criminal is ascertained to be
a drug addict, and the fact that some cocaine-crazed
addict occasionally commits a particularly vicious
crime, they jump to the conclusion that all drug
addicts are criminals, and that drug addiction is typi-
cal of the average criminal. Then they proceed to in-
crease the circulation of their particular periodical
by writing stories and articles based upon their mis-
apprehension of the true facts. From their sensational
writings, and their inclination to generalize about
"cokies” and "dope fiends”, a great many prejudices
and fallacies arise and become an integral part of
public opinion. They made no distinction between
criminal and non-criminal addicts, nor between the
users of cocaine and the users of morphia, as if all

175

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
addicts were of the same type, and all drugs produced
the same effect, when, as a matter of fact, nothing
could be farther from the truth.

It may be said, in general, that the average crimi-
nal addict uses the same drugs in prison that he uses
in the free world. Let us, therefore, study the im-
prisoned drug addict, and try to get at the truth
about him. It needs to be pointed out that the genuine
drug addict (the merchant as distinct from the oc-
casional user) very rarely comes to State Prison. For
the incidental crimes he commits he generally goes to
city or county institutions; and for his violations of
the narcotic laws he generally goes to a federal peni-
tentiary. It also needs to be pointed out that when
the average criminal comes to prison, he is only in
about twelve or fifteen cases out of a hundred a user of
drugs. Since, however, his term is usually a very long
one (sometimes for life) , and since he is by nature a
very self-indulgent person, he often seeks to escape
from the harshness of his circumstances and sur-
roundings through drugs. There are always old-timers
to teach him the ropes and there are always drugs to
be had, for a price. In this, however, he is not typi-
cally the drug addict, but typically the maladjusted
person seeking to escape from life. He becomes what
is called a "prison junker,” and is not considered by
the true addict to be the real thing. He generally hates
and despises and fears the drug, even as he uses it,
and considers the drug seller the lowest and most de-
praved of God’s creatures. I have frequently heard
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DRUGS AND THE CRIMINAL
"prison junkers” say, "I may be a thief, and I may
use 'junk’, but by Jesus I’d cut off my two hands be-
fore I’d sell the god -damned stuff!” He usually looks
upon the drug as a dangerous remedy for a dangerous
disease; as a necessary evil; as a species of counter-
poison; and not, like the true addict, as the be-all and
end-all of life. For although he enjoys the temporary
delusion of contentment which the drug produces in
him, he hates and fears the hideous after-effects; and
above all, he dreads the thought that in the end he
may become so helplessly enslaved by the drug that
he will have to keep on to the bitter end, and perhaps
wind up as one of the very drug sellers whom he so
heartily loathes. He has not, like the true drug addict,
resigned himself to the idea that "once you’re 'hooked’
— once the drug really gets into your blood — you’re
'hooked’ for life”; so he uses it sparingly, at first, and
periodically breaks his habit simply to prove to him-
self that he can and is thus not a slave to the drug;
and in general gives up only very gradually, after
years of resistance, to its uncontrolled, devitalizing
dominion. And even then he is rarely the seller, but
the user ; not the devotee, but the victim. He becomes
that most hard-pressed of criminals, the man who is
obliged to steal in order to support his drug habit.

It must be remembered, too, that the average
prisoner is usually a poverty-stricken fellow and thus
financially unable to support a prison habit. For drugs
generally cost about four times as much in a state
prison as they do in the free world or even in the

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
county jails. So that the average criminal is far more
likely to become merely a ** joy-rider” (a man who
takes a "shot” or two to tide him over dreary week-
ends in the cell, as he might in the free world take a
quart of whisky) , and not a genuine drug addict.

The question inevitably arises: To what extent do
cri minals go in for the use of drugs? And as is the
case in most matters which are of real importance to
the penologist, no reliable statistics are available.
There are, it is true,- certain prisoners who are listed
"D. A.” on the prison books. But for every "D. A.”
(drug addict) who is listed, there are several who are
unlisted. Here, however, I am able to make a pretty
accurate estimate. Every drug user in prison generally
makes the acquaintance of the other drug xisers. For
there are usually only two or three “connections” (or
sources of supply), and because of this, and the
general closeness of prison associations, an observant
prisoner eventually gets to know the other prisoners
who share his taste for drugs. Even now, after several
years, I could almost write out from memory a list
of the men in a certain prison who use drugs. And as
there were about one hundred and twenty of them
(to my certain knowledge) in a population of nine
hundred iiunates, it is a pretty safe guess that the per-
centage of drug addiction was approximately twelve
per cent and not more than fifteen per cent.

How far this percentage would hold good of the
average American prison^ is another matter. Still,

1 Pishman and Perlman say that ten per cent of the men sent
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DRUGS AND THE CRIMINAL
seeing that certain States with one or more big cities
would certainly show a higher percentage, while the
more sparsely populated States would certainly show
a lower, it may be taken, I think, that from twelve to
fifteen per cent of all prisoners are addicted to the
use of habit-forming drugs. Whether or not the same
figures would hold good of drug addiction among
criminals in the free world, I very frankly do not
know; but from a tolerably extensive acquaintance
among criminals, and no little knowledge of existing
conditions, I should be inclined to set the figures at
about twelve per cent.

Another favorite dogma among the fictioneers is
that all, or at least many, gangsters and gunmen are
drug addicts — that they are cowardly, cocaine-
crazed killers. This is easily the most absurd of the
many fallacies which they have established. It is like-
wise the most easily refuted. It is based upon two
assumptions; first, that cocaine is a highly inflam-
mable drug, making its users temporarily insane;
second, that because some spectacular killer is dis-
covered to be a cocaine addict, all gunmen and killers
are cocaine addicts. The gangster-gunman is thus
portrayed as a cowardly, sneaky, drug-crazed killer
who in his normal condition has not the courage of a
rabbit. Many writers of current fiction have deliber-
ately pandered to the prevailing trend of public
opinion by subscribing to this dogma. Some of them

annually to Welfare Island (N. Y.) were known drug users. See
American Mercury, op. cit.

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
are excusable on the ground of general ignorance of
their subject matter; but certainly not a certain mo-
mentarily popular author who owes his success largely
on material supplied him by the very gangsters whom
he now so glibly abuses. For he must know better.
One single atom of truth is enough to explode this
myth, and here it is: Most criminals who use drugs do
not use cocaine! At first glance this may seem of
trifling importance; but a closer scrutiny will prove
this fact to be of vital importance to the issue. It is
well known that cocaine is very dangerous in its
effects and that its continuous and prolonged use re-
sults in hallucinations and other forms of temporary
insanity. It is also tolerably well known that the ef-
fects of cocaine are remarkably conspicuous. In fic-
tion, on stage and screen, we have all seen the "dope
fiend” (who is really the cocaine sniffer) with his
itchy nose, jerky movements, and general air of
furtiveness. He is so well known, in fact, that most
people believe that all drug addicts are like that, and
that all drugs produce the same symptoms and effects.
This, of course, is pure nonsense. It is, however, this
very conspicuousness of the effects of cocaine which
makes the average criminal shun it as he would the
plague. It is true that an occasional criminal is an ad-
dict of cocaine; it is also true that when the other
drugs are temporarily unobtainable, the criminal drug
user will seek temporary rdief in cocaine; but in the
main it may be said that the average criminal drug
user is as likely to be a cocaine addict as he is likely to
i8o

DRUGS AND THE CRIMINAL
be a mural by Ribera. He knows that its effects make
him conspicuous and thus easily detectable; and that
it makes him too reckless and generally irresponsible
to function properly; and for these reasons alone he
would as soon leave his finger-prints at the scene of a
crime as to be seen under the influence of cocaine.

But this is only one side of the issue — and not even
the more important one. The more important mat-
ter — which leaves the fictioneers with hardly a leg to
stand on, is that the gangster is, of all criminals, the
one least likely to go in for the use of habit-forming
drugs. Consider the evidence! Although it is as unsafe
to generalize about the gangster as it is about the
clergyman or the prostitute, or any other particular
group or type, one general statement may safely be
made. The gangster is certainly the criminal who is
most perfectly adjusted to his environment. His en-
vironment is the slums, the underworld, where ruth-
lessness and physical bravery are the qualities which
count; and these qualities the gangster possesses to an
astonishing degree. He is generally a man of very
strong character and is very often a sheer megalo-
maniac. His lust is for the power of life and death,
wealth and political "pull”, and for the respect, ad-
miration and fear of other gangsters. These he usually
obtains through sheer ruthlessness and physical cour-
age. He is entirely suflScient unto himself and cer-
tainly is not in need of drugs to help him in his strug-
gle for prestige and leadership among his kind. And
since the person most likely to go in for drugs is the

i8i

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
person with a distinct feeling of his own physical,
mental, or emotional inferiority, it is obvious that the
gangster is the least likely of all persons to resort to
drugs.

This is not the place for a detailed discussion of the
gangster and of his activities. But since the foregoing
remarks may need a word of amplification, I may add
that I spent three and one-half years in Auburn
Prison, where I numbered among my friends and ac-
quaintances well-known gangsters like Owen Mad-
den, William Duffy, Terry Reilly, "Bum” Rodgers,
and hundreds of lesser heroes of the underworld. I was
in daily contact with them in prison, and I have as-
sociated with them even in the free world, and have
thus had plenty of time and opportunity to study
them. Now among the hundreds of gangsters whom
I have known, 1 have never known a single one who
was a cocaine addict! I have known several who,
while serving long prison terms, became "prison jvmk-
ers”, but I have rarely met a gangster who used co-
caine or had anything but contempt for the man who
did. It is not my purpose to glorify the gangster, but
truth is the truth; and although I dislike many of the
gangsters’ traits, and deplore his antisocial activities,
I must say that of all types of criminal I like the
gangster the best and heartily admire his courage and
loyalty to his kind.

The root of the whole fallacy about the gangster
and cocaine is to be found in the many imitation
gangsters who are appearing in increasing numbers
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DRUGS AND THE CRIMINAL
upon the current scene. Let me try to describe this
type of criminaL He is usually a man with a strong
inferiority complex. He longs for the adulation of his
associates, who are chiefly girl and “sheik” habitues
of dance halls. He reads about the exploits of real
gunmen and notices the stir they create in the press
and among the dance-hall girls. He sniffs himself
crazy with cocaine, goes out and commits some sense-
less but vicious crime, and believes that at last he has
“arrived.” He has. He has also given the shoddier
fictioneers another chance to cry out about the vi-
ciousness of the drug-using gangster.

What, I have been asked, is the effect of drug ad-
diction upon the criminal? This question inevitably
leads to a discussion of another favorite fallacy ad-
vanced by reporters and fictioneers; the dogma that
the drug addict will sacrifice his own mother for a
“shot” when he needs it badly enough. In general it
may be very bromidically said that the criminal is,
after all, a human being, and that the drugs have the
same effect upon him that they have upon law-
abiding addicts. A particular effect of the drug upon
the criminal, however, is that the expense of support-
ing his habit makes it necessary for him to increase his
activity. He is thus forced by the drug to commit
more crimes than he would ordinarily feel obliged to
commit. As for the dogma that he will sacrifice any-
thing on earth for the “shot” when he is badly in need
of it, I can only say this. The use of drugs is very in-
jurious to the physical and mental strength of the

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
user and naturally does not tend to increase his moral
strength. But that it will sap a man’s principles of
conduct to the point where he will sacrifice the repu-
tation of a friend, or hurt his own mother, is an ut-
terly false notion. I have known of addicts who went
through the most unbearable anguish rather than do
these very things. From a great deal of personal expe-
rience and observation of the effects of drugs, I say
that the use of drugs does not essentially change the
real character of the user. I have seen any number of
addicts refuse to sacrifice even their own vanity, or
self-respect, for a "shot”, when they needed it very
badly; and I am sure that if they could pass up a
"shot” out of mere vanity, they could certainly do so
if something really important were at stake. My be-
lief is that the idea of the moral disintegration which
is erroneously supposed to be due to the effects of
drugs is due to an entirely different thing. The fact
is, that only essentially weak individuals go in for
drugs; and that the sacrifices they make in order to
obtain drugs when they are hard up are due to weak-
ness which is inherent in the user and not caused by
use of the drug. In any circumstances such a man
would be weak and consequently likely to go to
pieces in time of stress. My idea is that while the ef-
fects of habit-forming drugs are anything but be-
neficent, they are not nearly so bad as they are sup-
posed by most people to be; and that the essential
character of the criminal is not greatly altered by
their use.

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DRUGS AND THE CRIMINAL

So far I have tried to indicate my belief that (a)
the drug addict is very rarely a true criminal, and
that the criminal is rarely a genuine drug addict;
(b) that only to the extent that he is more badly ad-
justed to life is the criminal more likely than the law-
abiding citizen to go in for drugs; (c) that only about
twelve or fifteen per cent of criminals go in for
drugs, either in prison or in the free world; (d) that
even when they do they are not genuine addicts but
merely "prison junkers”; (e) that the drug-using
criminal does not go in for cocaine, as a rule, because
of the conspicuousness of its effects, but \jses mor-
phia, the effects of which are mainly soporific; (f)
that the gangster is of all criminals the one least likely
to go in for drugs, least of all for cocaine; (g) that
most of the fallacies which exist in the public mind
on this subject are due to the sensational writings of
ignorant reporters and fictioneers; and (h) that al-
though the effects of drugs are far from beneficent,
they are also far from being as disastrous as is ordi-
narily believed, and that the use of drugs does not
materially alter the essential character of the user.

The one point, I find, on which I have not laid suf-
ficient stress, is that the drug-using criminal inva-
riably uses morphia (and not cocaine, or other drugs,
except in times of emergency, when morphia is for
any reason unobtainable). This is of greater signifi-
cance than it may seem. For if the effects of cocaine
are to make the user subject to hallucinations and
temporary insanity, the effects of morphia are almost

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
the opposite. In fact, the final effect of a ''shot** of
morphia is to put the user to sleep (it is for this pur-
pose that it is normally used) . This means, therefore,
that the criminal’s use of morphia would tend to pre-
vent him from committing those depraved and vi-
cious crimes which are characteristic of the cocaine
sniffer and for which the criminal (especially the
gangster) is so often wrongfully blamed. The use of
morphia by imprisoned criminals is almost inevitable.
Normally a self-indulgent person, and faced with the
prospect of long years in a harsh and depressing en-
vironment, he naturally seeks escape in drugs which
enable him to sleep most of his time away, or to spend
most of it in a hazy stupor of contentment produced
by the drug. The average criminal drug user’s atti-
tude toward the cocaine user is pretty well expressed
in the following remark (which I have heard made so
many times, and so fervently, that I am sure it is quite
sincere) : "Why, I wouldn’t dream of teaming up
with a ’cokey’! I tell you they’re crazy. I’ve seen them
pull out a gun and throw shots at what they imag-
ined was a policeman’s face in the window, when
there wasn’t a policeman within a mile of the place!
They’ll get a feller into trouble, and get him pinched,
every time!” To the imprisoned criminal, then, mor-
phia (which he uses in nine cases out of ten when he
uses drugs at all) is merely an escape mechanism, a
counter-poison; it is not the elixir of happiness which
it is to the true addict. I have known many convicts
who thus made use of morphia while in prison bur

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DRUGS AND THE CRIMINAL
stopped using it when they reentered the free world.
I used it myself, off and on, for the last seven years of
my imprisonment; but at no time did I cease to hate
it (as temporarily helpful as it was) , and in the free
world I no longer feel the slightest desire for it, We
(the "prison junkers”) are not, as I have said, the dev-
otees, but the victims of the drug, and use it only as
a means of escaping from unbearable, unmalleable re-
ality.

A final word as to the effects of drug addiction
upon the prison community as a whole. In the first
place, it creates havoc in the minds of honest guards
and other conscientious officials: they are constantly
obsessed with the fear that drugs will, in some mys-
terious manner, slip into the prison past their alert
eyes. This makes them overly suspicious. They watch
the prisoners receiving visits in the guardroom as they
might watch an angry rattlesnake creeping up to
strike them. This, in turn, breeds hostility to guards
and officials among the prisoners. The prisoner receiv-
ing a visit from his sweetheart sees the guard observ-
ing them closely. He thinks, "Is this so-and-so trying
to 'make’ my girl?” In this respect the presence
within the prison of habit-forming drugs is merely
one of a number of causes of friction between pris-
oners and officials.

Their presence also results in a great deal of fric-
tion among the prisoners themselves. Various cliques
try to get control of the intramural drug trade. There
are fights, often bloody and terrible to behold, not

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
only among the professional vendors, but between
prison addicts who accuse one another of "holding
out” on the secret supply of drugs.

These are comparative trifles, however. The chief
damage that drugs do to the prison is in the weaken-
ing of its defenses. A lot of melodramatic stuff has
been written about the wonderful and mysterious
ways in which prisoners smuggle drugs into the
prison. The favorite place for concealing drugs, in the
minds of fictioneers, is in the hollow heel of an ordi-
nary shoe. As a matter of fact this has happened —
along with other clever and mysterious incidents of
smuggling; but as a matter of cold fact, if this were
the only way in which prisoners could obtain drugs,
there would be very little drug addiction in prison.
The fact of the matter is that guards and instructors
bring the deadly commodity into the prison — visually
for twenty-five or more dollars a trip. The "right”
prisoners establish contact with a "right” guard. He
goes to a place, the address of which has been given
him. He generally goes there on his "day off”, gets the
little package, and brings it into the prison when he
reports back for work (he is usually a night guard).
. . . As I said a moment ago, the chief damage the
drug does is in weakening the defenses of the prison.
The average guard is a poorly paid man. He is always
ready to earn an extra dollar. He begins by bringing
in some petty item of forbidden goods; soon he is
bringing in the habit- forming drugs; and finally, hav-
ing gone that far, he is himself enmeshed in the net

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DRUGS AND THE CRIMINAL
of his own cupidity and more or less has to do as he
is told. Finally, as in the famous Trippi case (Trippi
killed a guard during an attempted escape and was
later electrocuted, and a great deal of drivel was writ-
ten about the mysterious ways in which the under-
world had provided him, in prison, with a gun) , the
guilty guard is asked to bring in guns, hacksaw blades,
various implements of escape — and being threatened
with exposure if he refuse — he is very likely to bring
in even these necessary weapons of death and jail
breaking.

Thus drugs, the use of which was intended merely
as a time killer, an escape mechanism, a way of find-
ing glorious dream life in the midst of lifeless drab-
ness, end by breaking down, or at any rate seriously
weakening, the defenses of the prison. Instead of pro-
viding Nirvana — as they do, incidentally, to the
prisoners who use them wisely — they create official
corruption and thus add to the general turmoil of
present-day living.

189

chapter VIII

.Prison Nights

T

JLHE working part of the day is ended. I’ve had
my supper. It wasn’t such an awfully bad supper,
little as I enjoyed it, much as I sympathize with the
prisoners who cry out about the lousy food. It isn’t
that the food is bad, or not nourishing. (The human
animal can live, it appears, on practically any kind of
food.) It is simply that it is so monstrously unexcit-
ing; the same dishes, week after week; so that one
can look at the noon meal and thus tell what day of
the week it is. . . ,

The next thing is the mail. The mail is brought by
the night guard on his first evening round. The time
between supper and mail is easily the longest hour that
ever was; it is practically interminable. Will I get a
letter to-night? Letters are so important to the pris-
oner. Aside from the rare monthly visits, they are the
closest link to the outside world, the only frail bridge
between the tomb and the green earth.

The guard eventually makes the round. There is
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PRISON NIGHTS

no mail to-night. . . . One is not so casual about it
as all that. The feeling which comes when the guard
walks past the cell without stopping — without slip-
ping the hoped-for letter between the bars — is a
composite of frustration and anger. I am sure that
the six o’clock guard has been cursed more fre-
quently and more profoundly than any official on
earth. The fact that it isn’t his fault makes no differ-
ence. The fact that it is irrational and unfair to ex-
pect letters every night does not matter either. . . .
One grinds one’s teeth, curses, paces up and down and
thinks, “All right. God damn the whole lot of you
out there. You couldn’t be bothered writing, eh? All
right. Wait till I get out!” And eventually one calms
down and picks up the dropped book and begins
reading again.

During the first year or two of my imprisonment,
I could always lose myself in a book, or amuse myself
making sketches, memorizing poems, studying, or in
any number of other ways. Every six months or so I
could count on a long and pleasant evening reading
over all the letters I had received and saved. . . . But
gradually I drifted into the common frame of mind,
which is one of listlessness and stupor.

I would lie down on the bed, a cigarette in my
mouth, a book in my hand, shut my eyes, and sail off
into the dream world — the ever-exciting, soul-
satisfying dream world. If, as was the case during one
period of my prison Ufe, I happened to have a supply
of morphia, I would already have taken a "pin

191

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
shot”,^ and for a time feel perfectly contented. If
not, the world of fantasy had to suffice. One can use
only what is available, satisfying or not. . . . Lying
there, my mind would go back over the pre-prison
years, always to those periods when I had been fortu-
nate in my contacts with women. The war years,
when it was so easy and so marvelous to meet lovely,
willing women. Tossing discontentedly about on the
bed, tormented by physical yearnings, by the unsated
hungers of the unmated animal, I would drift o£F into
the most incredible erotic fantasies. I might think of
a particular girl — of the girl who had been most
frankly and humanly the loving, caressing animal —
and remember emotions, feelings, endearing words:
“Oh, dear, love me, love me; nothing in this world
matters except to love.” . . . Fragments of verse
would come to mind. Lines like the following, writ-
ten by a prisoner:

Cruel, oh, cruel it is to lie

Each night in a womanless bed and sigh:

To dream of silky-fragrant breasts.

Tight-circling arms, down-loosened crests
Of scented hair, love-swoonmg eyes,

Soft-touching hands and velvet thighs:

Remembered nights of honeyed bliss
When long hours died in one short kiss:

Remembered words from one held dear,

Breathed through lips sweet-pressed to ear:

Bridging space from soul to soul,

^ A subcutaneous injection performed with a common safety
pin and a common eye dropper.

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PRISON NIGHTS

Making of frail halves a whole:

"Love me, dear, oh, ever, ever!”
“Darling, I shall love forever!”

Oh, cruel and cruel it is to yearn
With gnawing passions unabated!

To lie in a lonely bed and burn
With deep desires for years unsated!

Oh, bitter to know the nightly woe
Of desireful men too long unmated!

The hungering body would transform itself into a
free and limitless entity and go questing out into the
world, seeking, pursuing, yearning. Nothing could
withstand it. My fantasy’s function was perfectly ra-
tional; stilling a hunger. . . . Two hungers. . . .
They are best expressed in the credo — the unformu-
lated credo — of the prisoner: "I believe in the lust of
the flesh and in the incurable loneliness of the soul.” ^
I would lie there and toss about, wholly miserable,
hating life, willing to kill myself and get the whole
heartless business over with except for one restraining
fact: that one day I would be free again; knowing
that it would be so deliriously satisfying to live once
more, if only for a few days or weeks. . . .

There would be disgusting animal noises from the
cells below, above, or adjoining mine. . . . Hateful,
disconcerting interruptions. . . . One night a man
went mad, raving mad. His cell was below mine. He
was a fellow man, a brother, a companion. He went
^ Hjaimar Soderberg.

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
mad from sexual starvation, so I believe. . . . Sitting
here writing about it in the free world where women
are accessible, it seems impossible, unbelievable. But it
happened. There was a loud clatter of overturned im-
pedimenta; chairs, table, dishes, and what not. There
was a soul-shaking scream. Then a baleful silence, a
portentous silence. In an intuitive flash I realized what
had happened and why it had happened. Luckily, I
thought, I am so young that I can still hope to get
out and live again. This man has no such sustaining
hope. It is all over with him. My heart was full of
deep pity for him and hatred for the unintelligent
stupidity in this world which makes such tragedies
possible. It seemed unthinkable to me that any pris-
oner should fail to understand what had happened to
the man, and be full of sympathy. . . . Here I ex-
perienced another shock. . . . Instead of the mur-
murs of compassion I, without thinking, expected to
hear, I heard a loud and unfeeling chorus of catcalls,
vituperations, curses. The typical pattern of response
seemed to be resentment; the other prisoners hated to
have their momentary personal preoccupations dis-
turbed. "Lay down, you !” "Stick

your head in the bucket!” "Hit the gas pipe!”

It was nerve-racking, disillusioning experience.

At first, I mean during the early months and years
of my imprisonment, my erotic fantasies would be
relatively "normal” and harmless. But as the hunger
grew sharper, the trends of my day dreams became
unqualifiedly vicious. Especially rape — imagined
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PRISON NIGHTS
with all the soul-destructive details. A young and in-
nocent victim transformed by my power into a piti-
ful, broken creature. In actual life I could never
commit so foul a deed. And I certainly did not desire
thoughts and visions of so vicious a character. ... I
called myself a devil — a beast. God! Neverthe-
less, they came. . . . Nor were they always as de-
scribable as that. I have envisioned myself doing the
most perverted and inhuman and abnormal things —
things I could never find the courage to relate about
my dream life; things no publisher could print, and
no ordinary person read without being shocked and
disgusted. . . . Sexual starvation created these havocs
in my mind.

Oh, those prison nights! The essential unfeeHngness
of throwing a weak and self -obsessed man so entirely
upon his own resources for recreation and compan-
ionship. How many men in this world are fit company
for themselves? To lock a man into a cell for sixteen
out of twenty-four hours each day, to leave him
alone, not only with his raging hungers, but with his
consciousness of failure, of sin, of wrong-doing, and
at the same time to pretend to be interested in that
man’s welfare! If Society wanted to drive a man into
insanity or suicide, I can conceive of no more effec-
tive way of doing it.

It is after nine o’clock. It is time to go to sleep. Oh,
to be able to sleep! But when one is living so funda-
mentally inactive a life, with almost no exercise, with
practically no fresh air, the body simply docs not re-

195

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
quire eight hours’ rest each night. The man is tired,
bodily and spiritually, but he cannot sleep. He can
merely lie there and suffer. He can merely lie there
and think, and regret, and hate, and swear to have
revenge. . . . During the day it is bad enough; but
there are always certain things to keep a man up: the
need of pretending to be tough; of enduring what he
knows all his fellows are enduring; the possibility of
visits from the free world; the unwillingness to let the
"screws” (guards) see that they have the power to
hurt him. But at night one is wholly alone, entirely
on one’s own resources. And I am certain that Society
has done herself more harm (through viciovis crimes
committed by ex-prisoners who preferred death to
another dose of prison) , in the long run, than she has
done the prisoners themselves — which is saying a
great deal — by caging men up for sixteen out of
twenty-four hours like tigers in cages.

This is not, unfortunately, a history of punishment
during the Middle Ages. The essential facts I have
tried to describe prevail at the present moment in
most prisons. Here and there a few changes have been
made; but by and large, the outstanding feature of
prison life is sixteen out of twenty-four hours of lust-
ing in a cage. . . .

There are other physical details which might be re-
lated; but they are largely irrelevant. I scorn to de-
scribe such trivialities as that the bed is uncomfort-
ably hard, that the flash of the guard’s lantern after
“lights out” may wake one up and spoil the night’s
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PRISON NIGHTS
rest, that the smell of the bucket is horrible in Au-
gust. There are difficulties of these kinds, to be sure;
but they are difficulties which, in lesser degree, the
average free man in the outside world has to put up
with; they are not hardships which are peculiar only
to the convict.

The essential facts are that the man is in the cage
and that his hungers of the flesh and of the soul most
strongly assail him when he is alone. These two facts
are the underlying causes of prison stupor — the habit
of daydreaming, of escaping from reality — which is
the worst effect of imprisonment. First indulged in at
night, in the cell, the habit is carried over into the
drowsy morning hours, then to the drowsy noon
hour, until Anally it takes full possession of the man,
so that he spends most of his waking moments in a
species of hypnosis, nearly or utterly incapable of re-
acting to the normal emergencies of hfe. . . .

A restless, nightmarish night, after which one arises
more tired than when one went to bed, and it is
morning again. ("Yonder, see the morning blink!”)
But the cell has become so agonizingly unbearable
that the prisoner says, "God, but Fm glad to get back
to the shop this morning!”

197

Chapter IX

More Remembered Conversations on Crimea
Punishment and the Prison

Xn the dozen years I have spent in various prisons, I
can recall only a handful of convicts who were at all
remorseful about their crimes. None of these was of
the professional criminal class.

One of these was a man named Bradford, a neu-
rotic, conscience-stricken New Englander. He had
been in prison for ten years when I met him. Slightly
bald, with a long head and an underslung jaw, he was
extremely reticent and aloof with most of us. I had
worked beside him and talked with him occasionally
for nearly two years, before he thawed out to the
point where he would talk freely with me. And it was
only after learning through repeated discussions that
I had really read the works of Dickens (which he re-
vered almost as much as he did the Bible) that he gave
me his full confidence.

"Vic,” he said to me one day, "I know that I can
talk to you. You won’t go around telling every Tom,
Dick and Harry what I say and have them make a
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MORE CONVERSATIONS
fool of me. You’re a gentleman. I can talk to you.
The rest of them wouldn’t understand. They seem to
think it’s all a joke, being here, and the things we’ve
done; and they think a man’s gone crazy if he regrets
anything. But I’m not really a criminal, Vic. You
know I’m not. You’ve seen me and talked with me
for quite a while now; you must know I’m not a
criminal. I admit that I did a rotten, brutal, senseless
thing. But that’s the only crime I ever committed;
and I wasn’t myself that day. I had been drinking
and the devil must have got into me. I was like a crazy
man for a few hours. This was back in 1908, Vic. I
had been out of work. Times were bad. Oh, not like
they are now; but anyway, I had been loafing for a
couple of weeks and I got to drinking with a few
other fellows who were loafing. We used to meet in
an old barn near where I lived and spend most of the
day sitting around, talking and drinking. My wife
and I had quarreled about it several times and were
kind of on the outs with each other. Well, I got crazy
drunk one afternoon, and when I got home, Elva —
that was my wife’s name — she started berating me
again about my drinking and loafing. We got to quar-
reling again and I know I got as angry as the dickens.
I walked up and took her by the shoulders and I guess
I shook her up pretty good. As I say, I was mad as the
dickens. I remember I kept telling her, 'Will you shut
your mouth? Will you shut your mouth!’ She was
pretty mad too, and kept shouting at me to let her
go, that I was nothing but a drtinkard and a loafer,

199

Chapter IX

More Remembered Conversations on Crimea
Punishment and the Prison

In the dozen years I have spent in various prisons, I
can recall only a handful of convicts who were at all
remorseful about their crimes. None of these was of
the professional criminal class.

One of these was a man named Bradford, a neu-
rotic, conscience-stricken New Englander. He had
been in prison for ten years when I met him. Slightly
bald, with a long head and an underslung jaw, he was
extremely reticent and aloof with most of us. I had
worked beside him and talked with him occasionally
for nearly two years, before he thawed out to the
point where he would talk freely with me. And it was
only after learning through repeated discussions that
I had really read the works of Dickens (which he re-
vered almost as much as he did the Bible) that he gave
me his full confidence.

“Vic,” he said to me one day, “I know that I can
talk to you. You won’t go around telling every Tom,
Dick and Harry what I say and have them make a
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MORE CONVERSATIONS
fool of me. You’re a gentleman. I can talk to you.
The rest of them wouldn’t understand. They seem to
think it’s all a joke, being here, and the things we’ve
done; and they think a man’s gone crazy if he regrets
anything. But I’m not really a criminal, Vic. You
know I’m not. You’ve seen me and talked with me
for quite a while now; you must know I’m not a
criminal. I admit that I did a rotten, brutal, senseless
thing. But that’s the only crime I ever committed;
and I wasn’t myself that day. I had been drinking
and the devil must have got into me. I was like a crazy
man for a few hours. This was back in 1908, Vic. I
had been out of work. Times were bad. Oh, not like
they are now; but anyway, I had been loafing for a
couple of weeks and I got to drinking with a few
other fellows who were loafing. We used to meet in
an old barn near where I lived and spend most of the
day sitting around, talking and drinking. My wife
and I had quarreled about it several times and were
kind of on the outs with each other. Well, I got crazy
drunk one afternoon, and when I got home, Elva —
that was my wife’s name — she started berating me
again about my drinking and loafing. We got to quar-
reling again and I know I got as angry as the dickens.
I walked up and took her by the shoulders and I guess
I shook her up pretty good. As I say, I was mad as the
dickens. I remember I kept telling her, 'Will you shut
your mouth? Will you shut your mouth!’ She was
pretty mad too, and kept shouting at me to let her
go, that I was nothing but a drunkard and a loafer,

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
and that she was going to leave me, that she wouldn’t
live another minute with such a drunken brute. Fi-
nally, I don’t know if it was my shaking her, or the
smell of whisky on my breath, but she seemed to get
disgusted and gave me a violent shove, and I tripped
over a stove poker and fell over backwards on the
floor. Then the very devil must have got into me, Vic.
I remember she was standing there, taunting me about
being so drunk I couldn’t stand up. All I could see, in
my rage, was her face mocking me. I grabbed the
stove poker, and began beating her over the head with
it, all the while crying, 'Will you shut your mouth?
Will you shut your mouth!’ She fell down on the
floor. I threw the poker down beside her and walked
out of the house. I didn’t dream she was dead. All I
remember was thinking 'Well, I guess you’ll shut your
mouth now for a bit.’ I went back to the barn with
the fellows and told them I just beat hell out of my
wife. They laughed and gave me some more whisky.
I stayed there drinking all the rest of the day. Late in
the afternoon, I started for home. But I didn’t get
there. I never got home again; I never saw Elva again.
I was so drunk I passed out on the way home. They
found me lying in a ditch alongside the road. I woke
up in the county jail the next morning, and they said
Elva was dead, and I had killed her. My God, Vic, you
can’t imagine how I felt. I was a murderer. I felt rot-
ten and dirty and miserable. I couldn’t hold up my
head or look any one in the face. I can hardly do it
even now and it’s over twelve years ago. I’ll never feel
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MORE CONVERSATIONS
clean again, Vic. I’ll never feel right. I see Elva’s poor
face in front of me nearly all the time. I can’t get to
sleep at night for hours; I just lie there and see her,
and remember what a beast I was; what a dirty,
drunken brute. I wake up in the night, all covered
with cold sweat, dreaming about it. Why, look at me
now. I used to be a big, strong fellow; now I’m only a
bag of skin and bones. Nobody knows what I’ve suf-
fered, Vic. I’ve only told two other people about this,
in all the twelve years; and one of them was a min-
ister. He said God would forgive me; and I know he
must be right. They say if a man repents, all will be
forgiven. Then God must have forgiven me; for He
only knows what I’ve been through and how sincerely
I regret my life. Vic, I do not care if I never get out
— I do not care if I have to spend the rest of my life
in prison — if only I can undo what I’ve done. I know
that’s impossible; but I’d die cheerfully this very min-
ute if I could bring Elva back to life again, and wipe
out the past. But no — I’ll have to carry this cross
with me right to the grave. . . . Please don’t ever
tell the other fellows what I’ve told you, Vic. Oh, I
know you won’t. They’d only mock me, laugh at me,
make a fool of me. They don’t understand. All they
think of is this world. They never think of the Day
of Judgment. But I do. Jesus, if only I could bring
back the past and be clean once again! What I
wouldn’t give!”

The second was a young aristocrat, who had run
over and killed a child during one of his drunken es-

201

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
capades. He was too sophisticated and naturally ret-
icent to talk about it; but from his general attitude
and behavior there could be no doubt about the sin-
cerity of the remorse he felt.

The third was a middle-aged bond salesman who
had murdered a young manicvirist who had been his
mistress. Married, with two children, he had come to
the parting of the ways with his wife. For the sake of
the children and their social position, they did not di-
vorce each other.' During this time he had met and
fallen in love with the young and pretty manicurist,
spent money on her lavishly, and in general made a
perfect fool of himself. To her, he was merely an-
other "sucker” with money. When he learned the
truth about her, he became mad with jealousy. He set
a trap and caught her in the very arms of a yoimger
lover. When he berated her about her infidelity and
general sluttishness, she laughed at him. Then she pro-
ceeded to enlighten him as to his physical and emo-
tional shortcomings and tauntingly asked him if he
thought so lovely a girl as herself could possibly be in
love with anything about him except his money. He
went completely mad at this point, drew a gun which
he habitually carried, and emptied it into her cynical
face. His regrets, however, were not for his victim,
but for his wife and children, whom he had so fool-
ishly disgraced. He felt very badly on their account,
although he felt that the victim got more or less what
she deserved. He was rather sorry, too, for him-
self, reahzing that he had wrecked his career and

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MORE CONVERSATIONS
ruined his whole life in a moment of jealous rage.

He used to say to me, “Fm only a helpless old man
now, Vic. Suppose they were to let me out to-morrow
— I couldn’t even earn my own living. I’d just be an
object of charity. I’m no good for anything — to my-
self or to anybody else. Watch out for whisky and
women, lad; they’re the devil and all; they’re the
most dangerous combination under the sun. God
knows I’m sorry for what I did. Not that I give a
damn about that little gold-digger; but there was no
need of killing her. I didn’t mean to kill her; I just
wanted to show her up for what she was. But when
she started showing off in front of that other chap,
and telling me what a big chump I had been, I just
flew off the handle and shot her. I’m not so sorry on
her account. It’s on account of my wife and children.
Just think of the harm I did those innocent people
by my foolishness. I’d give my right arm to undo
what I’ve done! Not only that, but I’ve made a com-
plete mess of my own life. This is the only life I beheve
in; and it’s pretty damned tough to sit there night
after night in the cell and realize that you’ve thrown
away the only chance you’ll ever have to live. Take
my advice, lad; stay away from loose women and
strong liquor. They’ll get you down in the long run.”

The fact that I can remember only three or four
convicts who were truly remorseful and repentant,
out of the hundreds I have known, is the most im-
pressive evidence I can offer in support of my convic-
tion that there is practically no contriteness of heart

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
nor regret for past crimes, among convicts. They are
sorry, most of them, that they were caught. Regret
and remorse are as rarely met with in prison as virtue
and honesty. Most criminals, to be sure, pretend to be
sorry for their mothers, wives and families; but the
fact that a good two thirds of them go out and re-
peat their crimes tends to indicate that their sorrow
is largely a sentimental gesture. They want to want to
be sorry.

In their general behavior and in their expressed
thoughts, most convicts reveal an amazing callow-
ness; they are immature, infantile, in their various
attitudes toward life and human relationships. They
describe the most shameful and hair-raising exploits
exactly as an ordinary man would tell of some boyish
escapade, and seem convinced that the listener will
view their conduct as mere harmless devilishness.
Their chief need seems to be to impress the listener
with their daring, cleverness, importance, and gen-
eral lawnessness.

Charley Toomey is a case in point. "What a tough
break I had, to get caught just then,” says Charley.
"I was sitting right on top of the world. Only for
that dumb bastard Brocco (a fellow thief) Fd be on
the street yet. These thick-headed cops would never
have caught me, only for Brocco’s being such a dumb
chump. Look at the way I was living. I had the swell-
est little apartment you ever saw, over on Newbury
Street. That’s a pretty swell neighborhood, you know.
Course I gave ’em a ritzy name. 'John P. Cabot’ was
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one name I used to use a lot. Well, I had a radio, a
piano, a Frigidaire, a swell car, plenty of liquor —
good stuff too; none of this cut stuff. And what a
broad! Did I ever show you Estelle’s picture? I’ll let
you see it some time. What a doll! Weighs about a
hundred and twenty pounds; one of these platinum
blondes with blue eyes. And is she built! And could
she shake those hips! She’s about the hottest thing they
ever saw around here. Believe me, there were plenty of
guys giving Estelle a play. Guys like Teddy Burns,
that’s got that swell orchestra, and Nobby Nolan, the
dancer, and guys like that; they’d have given their
right leg to make that girl. But nothing doing. I had
her made proper! No chance for any of those guys
there. Why not? Swell apartment, swell car, plenty
of money; what more could a broad want. And I’m
not such a bad-looking guy myself when I get all
fixed up. Well, that’s the way I was living. Stepping
out every goddam night to some hot spot — the
Cherry Grove, the Egyptian Room, the Bosworth
Roof, and places like that. And would we knock ’em
dead? Say, the minute Estelle walks into a room, every

son of a in it sits up and takes notice. They don’t

come any niftier than she is. Do you think we weren’t
having the time of our young fives? I’ll say we were.
I had the dough — and that’s what counts nowadays,
believe me. And what a racket! When I’d run short
of dough. I’d go out and hunt up some small bank, or
something, that looked like an easy take. When I got
it all cased up, I’d go and get Brocco and a couple of

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other lads, and we’d step in and push it over. And
what push-overs most of those banks are! Always got
at least two or three grand for my end of the boodle,
too. Nothing petty about me. "When I go out after
the dough, I want dough, and no scratch. Jesus, I’d
be out there yet, too, only for that dumb son of a

of a Brocco! When I think what a chump he

was, I could tear my hair out by the roots for ever
having anything to do with him. But how the hell
could I know. Yoii can’t tell much about a guy until
the crash comes, and then it’s too late. And now look
at me. Jesus! I lose my apartment, my car, my radio
— I lose everything. If I didn’t get a tough break. I’d
like to know who did! Sitting on top of the world
like I was, and then to lose everything on account of
a stupid stiff hke that Brocco. I suppose Estelle will
stick. She better, the little bitch, after all the cocoa-
nuts I threw away on her. The worst of it was,
though, that I got caught when I was clean. I didn’t
have enough dough to get the right mouthpiece. Now
if I’d of had about five grand to throw to So-and-So,
or a guy like that, I bet Fd be on the street right now,
or at the worst I’d be doing a measly deuce down the
Island. Talk about tough breaks!”

Charley’s attitude is so typically that of the average
professional criminal that, having listened to it so
many times, I can recognize it after the first dozen of
spoken words. It is absolutely a pattern. The life thus
described, and the attitude toward it, are vital fea-
tures, too, of the continuous daydreams indulged in
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by the criminal when he is in prison. He projects him-
self into a coming life, after prison, which will be a
duplicate of the life he remembers and yearns for.
Thus even in his To-days, and in his daydream To-
morrows, he lives always in the Past, in his Yester-
days.

With the average raper, it is different. Unless he is
the raper of young children, sexually insane, the com-
plete degenerate, he feels that he is a pretty badly
abused and long-suffering individual. "I’m not a crim-
inal,” he says. "This girl was pretty young, but she
was old enough to know what she was doing. They
don’t get to be fifteen or sixteen nowadays without
knowing what it’s all about. This one kept teasing me
and leading me on. She was a little teaser, that’s what
she was. She was always playing around, looking for
just what she got. I’m only a man, damn it, and a man
can’t stand to be teased like I was, not unless he’s a
saint. Christ, what harm did I do the girl? She was
bound to get it sooner or later, the way she was act-
ing, either from me or from somebody else. I didn’t
do her any harm. I’ve worked hard all my life, and
gone to church every Sunday, and been a law-abiding
citizen, and yet they throw me into prison with a lot
of thieves and murderers, as if I was one of them. Is
that right? I just fell, once, for a temptation that was
too strong for me. No man with a drop of blood in
his veins could have helped doing what I did. Now,
here I am, doing ten to fifteen years, and all these
thieves and murderers insulting me and calling me

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names every day. And all the people of my town have
turned against me — the dirty hypocrites! Almost
any one of them would have done the same thing. If
I told all I know about some of them — church mem-
bers too — they wouldn’t look so high and mighty. I
wouldn’t mind a few months in jail, or something;
but to be thrown in here with a lot of thieves and
murderers! And I’ll be an ex-convict when I come
out! I won’t be able to go back where I come from,
or get any work. That’s a hell of a way to treat a man
who’s only made one mistake, isn’t it? Don’t the Bible
say to give a man a chance — seven times seventy
chances? I tell you, it isn’t right.”

Listen to the average stock swindler, embezzler,
and the like. "Hell,” he says, "you’d think they’d
show a little consideration for a man like me. I was a
decent member of the community, a gentleman. I
never went out and murdered any one or robbed any
one at the point of a loaded gun. I got away with
some money, yes; but so does every business man;
that’s what he’s in bxjsiness for. As for its being a
swindle — all those people who got trimmed deserve
to be trimmed. Then, when they lose, they go run-
ning to the police like a lot of stuck pigs. Well, as I
say, you wouldn’t mind if they’d put you in some
decent place, where you could associate with your
own kind; but they throw you in here with thieves
and rapers and murderers and degenerates — with
the very scum of the earth. Believe me, the next time
I won’t stay around waiting to be caught, or helping
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the district attorney’s office straighten things out. No,
sir! I’ll grab a boat for Cuba, or some place, and start
right out for parts unknown!”

Or listen to the average murderer. He often main-
tains that he was completely innocent and wrong-
fully convicted (as do many thieves and rapers) ; he
usually feels that, even if guilty, he was wholly or at
least partly justified in killing; and in nearly all cases
he feels that his punishment is too severe, his sentence
too harsh. It is small wonder, however, that a man
who has been in prison for ten, twenty, or thirty
years, with no prospect of getting out in the im-
mediate future, should become addicted to self-pity
and maudlin wishfulness.

He says, "They might better have electrocuted me
in the first place, and got it over with, than to have
made me suffer what I’ve suffered. It is true that I
killed a person. But do they realize that I was driven
and goaded into doing it. What I did was done in a
fit of angry passion. I simply didn’t know what I
was doing. For the moment I was completely out of
my mind. And now I have to spend the rest of my
life in prison. I’m not a criminal. I’m not a degener-
ate. This is the only crime I ever committed. They
know that if I were to be released to-morrow I’d
never commit another crime. And yet I have to stay
here, year after year, with a lot of degenerates and
thieves, the very lowest people in the world. Christ,
don’t they stop and think what a man must suffer in
here? What the hell is 'sufficient punishment’, if ten

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
or twenty years of prison isn’t enough. It’s a wonder
I don’t go completely crazy thinking about it (many
of them do) . And you can’t get out unless you’ve got
plenty of money or political connections. It isn’t
right.”

Now listen to the convicts as they talk about prison
life and other things pertaining to crime and punish-
ment.

Says one, "Did you see that piece in yesterday’s
Post about how prisons are getting to be Men’s Clubs?

I’d like to see the son of a who wrote that piece

come over here with a sentence of about five years;
he’d goddam soon change his tune. What the hell
is the matter with the guys that write articles like
that? They must be guys that we clipped for a few
bucks some time or other and they want to get even
with us. Is that it?”

“Naw,” says another. "They’re just nuts. They
read in the paper how Sing Sing has a football team,
or how we’ve got radios in our cells, and right away
they think a prison is like one of the Statler hotels.
They don’t stop to figure that we’re only out on the
football field a half-hour or so a day, or that we
only use the radio at night, or on Sunday, when we’re
in the cells, and that the rest of the time we’re grind-
ing away in some stinking shop making automobile
plates or cheap shoes. They don’t stop to figure things
right; and some of them wouldn’t give a damn if
they did. They just see a chance to take a sock at us,

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and so they write one of these lousy pieces in the
paper, or make a speech in front of a bunch of
women. It’s guys like that crazy bastard over here
in Whatsis County — what was his name, So-and-So?
They get hot in the pants and take it out on us. I
guess their consciences must be bothering them about
the helpless guys they sent over here with big bits, so
they try to make themselves feel better by trying to
show what a lot of bastards we are, and how swell
we get treated in prison.”

"Yeah,” says Number Three. "It’s a crime the stuff
they write about us. And they don’t know what the
hell they’re writing about in the first place. Most of
them never even saw the inside of a prison. Even
these psy — psych — bug doctors that come over here
and give us the bug tests. What do they know? They
make us put a few blocks together and answer a lot
of crazy questions about did you ever lay your
mother or sisters. What the hell do they know about
us? I never told them anything that wasn’t already
on the books — I just gave them a lot of crap — and
so did everybody I know. But to hear them, you’d
think they knew something about us.”

"And take the chaplain,” says Number Four. "He’s
been here all his life. But what does he know? Only
what them goddam bibleback cons tell him over in
his office. He wanders around the shops and yard, and
says 'hello, how’s things’, and gives a speech in the
chapel on Sundays. That’s all he knows. But every
other day you see a piece in the papers where he’s been

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giving a lecture to some club, or something, about
'Within Prison Walls.’ Can you tie that? Why, he
don’t know what it’s all about yet — he never will
know. But he gets paid for those lectures. What a
racket he*s got!”

"Yes,” says Number Five, “and take these goddam
papers. What do they know? They’re always riding
hell out of us. Before a guy goes to trial they’ve
printed so much crap about him that you couldn’t
get a fair jury in the whole damned State. You’re
convicted before you even get into court. And the
'crime waves’ they’re always writing about, whenever
they run out of news! That’s what keeps a lot of us
poor bastards from getting out of here on parole.”

“Sure,” says Number Six. “They don’t any of them
know what the hell they’re talking about. Now take
this place here. How do they figure a place like this
is going to 'reform’ a guy; will you tell me that? Even
if we’re all a little off the onion, as the bug doctors
claim we are, how the hell is this place going to help
us any? If a guy is sick and they send him to a
hospital, they have doctors and surgeons there that
can tell what’s wrong with him, and give him medi-
cine, or operate on him, or like that. But what have
they got here? Nothing but a lot of half-wit screws
that don’t even know what’s wrong with themselves,
let alone us! And all the treatment they ever give a
guy is a growl, or a few days’ bread and water. That
certainly don’t do a guy any good. It hurts him.
Christ, when a guy goes to the hospital, or even to
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a school, they don’t just leave him laying around on
a bed or sitting in a chair; they do something for
him. What do they do here? They just give you three
half -arse meals a day, a cell to sleep in, and keep you
grinding all day in some goddam shop. Do they think
that’ll reform a guy?”

"That’s right, pal,” says Number Seven. "And take
it in these shops. If they’d even teach a guy a trade —
make him learn a trade — you wouldn’t mind. Then
a guy would have something to fall back on if he felt
like hitting the straight and narrow. But what do
they do? They put you to work making automobile
plates, or something that’s only done in prisons; stuff
you couldn’t get a job at outside if you wanted to;
and the machinery is all twenty years out of date;
and the instructors don’t know anything about up-
to-date methods; and the materials you get to work
with are so lousy that you can’t learn to do decent
work even if you want to. Here I am. I’ve been work-
ing in the shoeshop for five years. What good will that
do me? In the first place, the work I’m doing is done
by women and children outside; it don’t pay any-
thing; and if I tried to get away with the lousy kind
of work I’ve been taught to do, I wouldn’t last two
hours in an outside shop. The print shop is the only
shop in here where a guy could learn a decent trade;
but Christ, there’s only room for forty guys in that
shop, and you have to be a high-school graduate to
get in there. That don’t do the rest of us any good.
There’s a thousand men here, and only room for

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forty or so over in the print shop. And not only that,
but So-and-So was always threatening to close the
print shop because it didn’t show enough profits.
That’s all they think about here. They don’t give a
damn about us learning a trade; all they care about
is having the industries show a profit!”

“And take a guy when he gets out of here,” says
Number Ten. “Times are lousy outside. Even guys
who know their trades, guys that can get swell ref-
erences, can’t get a job nowadays. And if they can’t
get work, how in the name of Christ are we going to
get it — even if we want it? And the jobs you can get
don’t pay anything — not enough to five on. A guy
might better be in here than out there starving to
death. How the hell is a guy going to live on twenty-
five or thirty bucks a week, especially if he’s married?
I know plenty of families do live for even less than
that; but not a guy that’s been used to living the way
we have. Take the average guy that’s been stealing all
his life. Why, he spends that much for taxicabs and
theater tickets, and crap like that. He’s used to good
hotels, and swell food, and ritzy clothes, and high-
priced women. Then keep him in prison a few years,
where he can’t get any of these things. Do you think
he’s going out and work for twenty-five bucks a
week? Like hell he is! He’s going to do what I’m go-
ing to do. I’m going to grab me a gun and go right to
work and get back in the money. Me work for starva-
tion wages, while some millionaire rides around in a
Packard and drinks champagne? Don’t make me
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laugh! I’m going to make somebody pay for the years
I’m putting in here.”

"The hell of it is,” says Number Eleven, "that it
don’t work out like that. By the time a guy gets out
of prison the cards are all stacked against him. He’s
out of toxich with all the rackets; he’s got a prison
record — and that’s all it takes to convict him, now-
adays; he’s been finger-printed and mugged; a lot of
dicks and cops know him by sight. Between that and
the police radio signals, and stuff like that, a guy with
a record is licked before he even starts. I think a guy
with a prison record, that goes out of here and steals,
is crazy in the head. He hasn’t got a chance. Not only
that, but it isn’t worth it. No matter how much
dough you get, what good is it if you have to come
back here afterwards — and the chances are you’ll
come back here with a twenty-to-thirty bit when you
do come. Even if you had some of the dough left
when you got out, it would be bad enough; but how
many guys have a dime left when they come out of
the can? And you’ll be an old man by that time. I
say it’s a sucker’s racket.”

"Yeah,” says Number Nine. "It’s a sucker’s racket,
all right; but what can a guy do? I can see you going
out of here and going straight — yes, I can!”

"I don’t say I’m going straight; but you can bet
your solid ivory skull I’m not going out on any racket
they can send you back here for; not me. I’m going
to work — bootlegging, or something half legitimate,
where all they can give you is a fine, or six months.”

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“Hell,” says Number Ten, **you*re way behind the
times, pal. They ain’t no more dough bootlegging.
Only the big shots that buy and sell it by the boatload,
or the guys that own the big night clubs, are making
even expenses. You been in the can too long; you don’t
realize what this here depression has done to the coun-
try. Listen, you know they’ve all gone for bootlegging
now — the drug stores, butcher shops, barber shops
— ev’rybody. Why, I know one single block on the
west side in NeW York — just one city block, mind
you — where there are thirty-five speakies or bottled-
goods joints! Thirty-five in one block! Too much
competition. No money for nobody.”

“Well, then,” says Number Eight, "what the hell is
a guy going to do when he gets out?”

“There’s only one thing he can do,” says Number
Ten. “Do what all the mobs are doing — do what I
was doing — go out and steal! It may be a sucker’s
racket, and all that; but the way things are now, there
isn’t a goddam thing else he can do, if he wants to live
right. It’s either that or the bread line.”

“WeU,” says Number Eight, "I’U be damned if I’m
going to hit any bread lines as long as there are guys
riding around in Packards and going to Florida for the
winter. Not me. That’s the trouble with this country.
The Bolsheviks are right. Is it right for nine men to
starve so that one man can ride around in a Packard?”

"Aw, you’re getting stir-simple,” says Number
Ten. "I suppose you’d like it if they was to divide up
all the dough, so that everybody had jtist as much —
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or in other words, nothing. Yes, you would! Those
Bolsheviks are all wet, anyhow. Don’t they believe in
free love, and no religion, and crap like that? And
how the hell are you going to steal any dough if
nobody’s got any? None of that bunk for me. Let
things ride the way they are. Just take it easy, and
before you know it, things will be all right again.”

"By Christ, it’s pretty tough, though,” says Num-
ber Fourteen. "A guy has practically got to steal, the
way things are outside. Take it in my case. I’ve got
a wife and three kids to look after. The wife’s been
working since I came here — when she could get any
work. She’s been getting a few bucks a week from
the welfare people too. But that’ll stop when I get out.
And there I’ll be, with a wife and three kids on my
hands and no trade, and no work, and no money.
What the hell can I do, but steal?”

These conversations are entirely typical of the pro-
fessional criminal. Those of the non-professionals are
so essentially those of the average law-abiding citizen
that they need not concern us in the present discus-
sion. As I have stated before, and tried to show in these
conversations, the average professional criminal is
usually an extrovert, little given to introspection, and
very little inclined toward reflection about things
which do not closely concern his personal comfort.
Although he is mentally acute in certain ways, reflec-
tion and analysis are foreign to his nature, except
when, occasionally, some newspaper-created "crime
wave” temporarily hurts his chances of making parole.

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What he is chiefly concerned about is, "When do we
eat?” "What’s the show for Sunday?” "How much
time have I got left?” or "Do you think I’ll have a
chance of making parole?”

Chapter X

Prison Stupor

j/^.T the age of sixteen I was working as office boy
for a commission merchant who owned a warehouse
in the freightyards near the State Prison. Occasionally
I was sent on errands which took me past the main
gate of the prison, through the steel-barred gate of
which I could usually see one or more trusties raking
the lawn or working in the garden. One day I stopped,
leaned against the steel pickets of the fence which en-
closed the prison courtyard, and looked in. A trusty
in a suit of striped overalls was standing with his arms
folded lazily against the handle of the rake, his head
resting dejectedly on his arms, his whole attitude that
of a man who had worked all day and was very tired,
although it was only about nine o’clock of a cool
spring morning. He seemed almost in a coma. There
was an expression of utter indifference on his face, and
his eyes were glazed with absent-mindedness. He was,
although I did not know it then, a living example of
the total, final, devastating effect of imprisonment
upon the human being.

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS

Six years later I was serving my first term of im-
prisonment in this very prison. As I stood in the line
at “bucket parade” one morning, another column of
convicts marched past us. In it was a young man of
about my own age (twenty-two) who was surrepti-
tiously laughing and joking with a companion. He
was apparently a recent arrival and certainly a first-
termer; his face, his movements, his whole attitude
expressed youth and health and unconcerned gaiety.
An old-timer who was standing beside me said, out of
the corner of his mouth, “This place will take a lot
of that steam out of him in pretty short order!” There
was a kind of admiration tinged with sadness in his
eyes as he said it. “I was like him a few years ago,”
he added. Without knowing why, I somehow knew
that the old-timer was right; that imprisonment
would eventually rob the young prisoner of his gaiety,
his spirit and something 1 call the gaiety of his tissues.
I thought of the somnolent trusty I had seen years
before. All about me I could see men with the same
expressionless faces, the same sluggish, lifeless move-
ments. The deadening result of imprisonment.

Each afternoon as we left the tiresome shops and
came out into the recreation yard, I would tear madly
to the locker to secure a glove and ball, and exercise
furiously for the brief half-hour we were allowed to
remain in the fresh air. More than one old-timer,
seeing me so full of vigor each afternoon, would say
to me, “Go to it, kid! Keep yourself in good condition.
If you don’t, why the goddam place will get you
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PRISON STUPOR
down; and once it gets you down, you’re down for
keeps. I used to be full of pep, too, when I first came
here. But that was ten years ago! Now I’m lucky I can
navigate at all. Take my advice, kid, and don’t let up
for a minute. The minute you let yourself go slack
— you’re gone. It’ll get you surer than hell.”

What was this horrible thing, I wondered, which
could make weak dawdlers of men who had been full
of health and strength a few years ago? As the years
rolled past, I began to learn. The remarkable thing
about it, I thought, was that the convicts were aware
of its wide prevalence and yet seemed powerless to
keep out of its constricting clutches. It struck me that
there must be something very devious and dangerous
about an afi[liction which could attack men who were
conscious not only of its unconcealed presence, but
also of its cruel power. There was, and there is! To this
day, I have never lost my fear of it. I dread it as I
dread the thought of being gripped by some powerful
and xmbreakable habit like drug addiction. For I will
go so far as to say that I consider its effects as enervat-
ing and demoralizing as the effects of a habit-forming
drug. That a man may come out of prison penniless,
lacking friends, without a home or a job, is, to my
mind, not nearly so awful as that he may come out a
victim of prison stupor (as some of us term this
malady). With a reasonably healthy body and a
reasonably balanced mind, the ex -prisoner might over-
come such handicaps as poverty or unemployment;
but if his handicap is also a bad case of prison stupor.

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
it will go very hard with him. It is a hard fact that all
men who have been in prison for a long time are
victims in greater or lesser degree of this disease.

By this time the reader is likely to be saying: “What
is this prison stupor?” I can best answer the question
by describing the aspects and factors of the prisoner’s
mental, social, physical and emotional environment
which causes him to give way to this prison paralysis.

There are, to begin with, certain lesser things which
undermine the convict’s physical strength. For ex-
ample, in the Massachusetts State Prison at Charles-
town, where I served my last prison term, we were
obliged to spend most of our time (sixteen out of
twenty-four hours a day) in poorly ventilated cells or
stuffy shops. (This is not ancient history, either; the
prisoners at Charlestown continue to get only half an
hour a day in the recreation yard except on Saturday
afternoons, when they get one and one half hours. ) ^
This meant, of course, that the prisoners were deprived
of sunshine, fresh air and wholesome exercise to a
point far below the requirements of physical well-
being. The food, moreover, although it was plentiful,
was badly cooked, sloppily served, and on the whole
fearfully dry and uninteresting; the more so since,
from lack of air and exercise, our appetites were
naturally far below normal. And we ate it alone, in
our cells, so that we might not fight or conspire with

^ For a description of the dally routine, etc., at Charlestown,
see a paper by Field and Winslow, Journal of Criminal Law and
Criminology, Vol. XXIll, No. 2, July— August, 1532.

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each other. Thus cheated of proper nourishment, sun-
shine, fresh air and exercise, we gradually lost strength
and vitality. But no matter how under-vitalized a
man might become his carnal appetite seemed to re-
tain its full strength (which is natural enough, seeing
that our sexual hunger was never appeased) ; and in
our cells, where we were obliged to spend more than
two thirds of our whole sentence, we were constantly
subject to erotic fantasies generated by the sexual
hunger. This led to occasional, frequent, or even
habitual masturbation, which also wore down our
physical powers of resistance. Gradually we grew dull
and lethargic, our bodies succumbing slowly to all
these forms of malnutrition.

Then, too, we spent the working hours of the day
in stuffy, overheated (in the winter, cold) shops,
where the daily task was insufferably dull and uninter-
esting. The paltry half-hour of exercise in the dry,
grassless, dusty yard, where even the air was stale and
impure, was certainly not enough to offset the eight
hours of shop time — to say nothing of the fourteen
torpid hours of cell time which followed each after-
noon recreation period. Day by day, therefore, we
grew physically inert; and after a few years of im-
prisonment, we no longer had the energy, even when
we had the desire, to exercise vigorously during yard
time — unless we were the unusual men who had the
strength of mind or character deliberately to exer-
cise and thus build up strength with which to fight
off attacks of prison stupor.

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
There were also numerous mental and emotional
circumstances which helped to ripen us for the sickle
of living death. Except during the yard period, a man
could not choose his associates. In the shop he had to
associate with the men who happened to work beside
him, whether he liked them or not. Only rarely did
he £nd himself working beside agreeable companions.
Yet he had to spend about one third of his whole term
with these unchosen fellow workers in the shop. For
the most part, he had to get on as best he could by
himself , and have as little intercourse as possible with
companions who proved uncongenial. This threw him
back upon himself far more than was good for him.
Contacts with guards and other prison officials were,
for the most part, just as futile and just as imavoid-
able. That the incompatibility of temperaments was
mutual did not make any difference; the effects were
exactly the same. Not only that, but visits from out-
siders — from relations, sweethearts, wives and other
well-loved friends — were of course rare, far too rare
to give the prisoner those frequent and varied mental
and emotional contacts which might have kept his
mind and emotions active and reasonably well-
balanced. Like a wanderer in a strange, crowded city,
the man in prison was lonely, despite the close prox-
imity of numerous fellow convicts. He could see his
chosen associates — the men he liked — only during
the brief daily recreation period, unless he happened
luckily to be assigned to the same shop as his friends
(and this did not happen very often) . As a matter of
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PRISON STUPOR
fact, it was the real (though undeclared) policy of
the shop guards and higher prison ofiScials to keep
friends and gangs separated, lest when trouble began
there be too great a fraternity of spirit — a useful
precaution for purposes of discipUne, but simply bad
for men. This lack of social, mental and emotional
contacts, together with the malnutrition and other
physical factors already mentioned, had the effect
of throwing the prisoner almost entirely upon his
own resources; and it was only the very highly en-
dowed prisoner who had within himself the necessary
qualities of intelligence and understanding to be a
good companion for himself, since he had to spend
two thirds of all his time in his companionless cell.
He could, of course, read, or otherwise consume or
utilize these leaden-footed hours of solitude; but
reading and other solitary diversions began to grow
deadly and unsatisfying after a few years of im-
prisonment; and it was then that the prisoner was
obliged to look within himself for the coixrage,
strength and patience to endure his misery. Usually
he was by nature deficient in these vital qualities, and
thus likely to give way to a self-pity based upon
realization of the tragedy of his life. Constantly crav-
ing freedom, furiously hating all restraint, hungry for
food, liquor, women and bodily and spiritual necessi-
ties, his thinking became colored by his needs and
wants, and in time he developed into an aching bundle
of unsated desires and wishful yearnings. I do not
mean to imply that this particular prison is unique

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
or that prison stupor is a product only of an occa-
sional prison. It arises wherever men are in confine-
ment. Furthermore, the normal man in the free com-
munity makes the most desperate attempt to escape
from it. See how bored people are unless they can go
to the theater or movies or play cards, or work and
play in some exciting way. The human being, by and
large, is a very bad companion for himself; where
he has to face himself for any length of time, he
acquires a deep disgust and a restless anxiety which
make him seek almost any escape.

The total effect of these circumstances was to make
him an easy victim of the prison paralysis. But this,
unfortunately, was not the whole story. There were
other environmental factors which contributed
greatly to his lapse into the prison stupor. Among
these was the utter lack of responsibility. The prisoner
did not need to worry about food, clothes, or shel-
ter; he had no rent to pay, no expenses except for
smoking supplies and occasional groceries. All these
items were supplied him by the State (in however
insufficient or unsatisfying quantities). Neither did
he have to worry about a job or about planning his
day’s work; all this was a matter of ordinary prison
routine. He was given a daily task to do, and after a
time performed it almost automatically. This re-
sulted in loss of initiative, loss of physical and mental
alertness. Never being called upon to exercise these
qualities of mind or behavior, his sense of responsi-
bility, his faculty of mental alertness, his powers of
226

PRISON STUPOR
initiative became so feeble from disuse that they were
often atrophied to the vanishing point.

As demoralizing as anything was the overabun-
dance of leisure. In prison there was never any hurry
about anything, from the prisoner’s point of view.
When he saw a fellow convict unduly concerned or
impatient about anything, he woiild say, “What’s the
rush? You ain’t going anywhere.” Thus procrastina-
tion became a habitual thing. Anything which could
be put off until to-morrow was put off until to-
morrow. The prisoner had so much time in which to
do things that he never got anything done. This
created a habit of indolence, of laissez-faire. The com-
mon attitude was, “Swim with the stream!” “There’s
plenty of time!” “There’s no hurry!” “Take it easy!”
So that most of his activity eventually consisted in
wasting, killing, consuming, frittering away the over-
powering leisure.

Drugs were another factor in undermining the
resistance of the prisoner. Perhaps about fifteen per
cent of them became “joy-riders” (prison drug ad-
dicts) . But since the use of drugs is a habit very much
like prison stupor itself, it needs no discussion here.
It must, however, be fisted as an environmental factor
which was favorable to the development of the other
and equally pernicious habitual escape from real
living.

Then there was the general apathy of guards and
other prison of&cials. The prisoner soon learned that
he might expect little help or encouragement from

2ZJ

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
officials; and so he eventually ceased looking for any;
and thus, from still another angle, he was thrown
back upon his own diminishing resources.

Perhaps the most important factor in the prisoner’s
general loss of morale, however, was the sense of
failure, the sense of inferiority he felt simply because
of his being in prison. No matter how loudly he might
laugh at his conventional and law-abiding fellows in
the free world, and no matter how hard he might
pretend to think them craven fools, there were al-
ways a few friends or relations in whose eyes he had
lost caste — and this knowledge was disconcerting
and tended to weaken his confidence in himself. He
knew that they deemed him a moral weakling, as the
failures and misfits of this world always know they
are looked down upon (however charitably and un-
derstandingly) by their stronger, better endowed fel-
lows. Under more favorable conditions, this sense of
inferiority might have spurred the prisoner on to the
attainment of a real and complete rehabilitation. As
it was, he had become so utterly becalmed, mentally
and physically, that he simply did not have the capa-
city for concentrated activity. Too weak to make any
progress toward remedying his condition, he in-
evitably slipped farther and farther backward;
and this made him all the more prone to prison
stupor.

Since, therefore, practically everything in the prison
environment contributed to the gradual demoraliza-
tion and collapse of the prisoner, I believe that prison
228

PRISON STUPOR
stupor may rightly be called the £nal, total, most
devastating effect of imprisonment as it exists to-
day.

The circumstances and factors which contribute
to its development and growth having been described,
let me now try to describe the disease itself. Prison
stupor is a species of bodily and spiritual anemia. It
is largely self -induced, a kind of unconscious habit of
self-dramatization or auto-hypnosis. From the host
of unsatisfied desires and needs of the imprisoned man
(desire for sensual pleasure and comfort, desire to
forget the daily round of dullness and misery, the
horrible surroundings, the uncongenial associations,
the painful realities of unsatisfying life) comes a deep
if usually unconscious urge to get away from it all,
to escape from the intolerable environment. The
prisoner begins mentally (and often physically as
well) to shut his eyes whenever he gets a chance; he
begins to project himself into the remembrances of
some former life, or into some imagined future world
in which his desires will be satisfied and life made
pleasant. These projections are often erotic, since
the prisoner suffers so greatly from sexual starvation,
but as often they are future triumph and future
revenge. But whatever form his dreams may assume,
he is always trying to compensate himself for the
hurts and shocks and hungers of the present unbear-
able life. He seeks happiness, if only in the spurious
world of his imaginings. This gives him a certain
mild and temporary relief. Futile as it is, it is the only

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
thing the prisoner can find. Slipping farther and
farther into this habit of daydreaming and self-
dramatization, he is in the end so far gone that he
spends nearly all of his waking hours in the world of
fantasy. The danger of this can hardly be exagger-
ated; its final result is occasionally madness, and at the
least, a pretty strongly entrenched neurosis. The dan-
ger is that the dream world may become so satisfying
and vital to the prisoner that he will eventually slip
over the edge, lok control, and spend all of his time
in it.

Its effects become noticeable very quickly. A
prisoner comes hurrying out of his cell at noon with
the bucket in his hand (which should be carried out
only in the morning). As his fellow convicts begin
laughing at him, a foolish expression comes over his
face. He realizes that he has been in a trance in which
he has lost all track of time. The other prisoners know
this too. They say, "It won’t be long now!” Or “Jones
has gone stir-simple” (another name for the prison
stupor) .

A man gets up in the morning, dresses, except for
his shoes, and after breakfast lies down on his bed and
drifts off into the dream world. When the bell rings
for shop, he jumps up, siezes his bucket and dirty
dishes, and dashes out into the corridor before he
notices that he has no shoes on. He is likewise laughed
at. Again prisoners and guards look knowing and say,
“It won’t be long now!” They mean that it won’t be
long before Jones becomes a candidate for the in-
230

PRISON STUPOR
sane asylum. It frequently happens that, coming out
to the shop in the morning, one hears as a bit of local
gossip, "Jones broke up his furniture last night.
They’ve got him up in the Blue Room (the ob-
servation ward). He’s gone completely out of his
head.”

And in the shop, at almost any hour when I might
stop working and look about me, everywhere I would
see men sitting in listless, sleepy inactivity, jaws slack,
eyes glazed, living for the moment in the world of
dreams. If I spoke suddenly to one of these men, he
would recover consciousness with a start, look at me
in a slightly caught-out way, and murmur, “I was
a million miles away from here when you spoke,” and
wait for me to express my understanding of his lapse
by saying, "Sure, I’m like that myself, half the time.”
For nearly all prisoners are aware that they have
grown mentally and physically dull, although few
of them stop to analyze the causes of their dullness,
or to realize its dangers. They say, "A guy gets in a
fog after spending a few years here; it’s the goddam
place itself that does it. How can a guy be on his toes
all the time in a joint like this?”

All the prisoners suffer in varying degrees of in-
tensity from prison stupor, depending largely on
their age, length of present or former servitude, but
depending even more upon their own personal atti-
tudes toward life. If they are without hope or ambi-
tion, if they are serving long terms or life, if they
have no prospects of release in the immediate future,

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
they are pretty surely doomed to a protracted siege
of the prison stupor. Only the rare man with a strong
mind or character, or with a definite purpose or ambi-
tion in life, is able to fight it o£F; and even he does
not get off scot-free. He, too, will find himself grow-
ing listless and absent-minded and giving way to oc-
casional fits of daydreaming. But this man is too rare
in prison to count; in the main it may be said that
not one prisoner in a thousand escapes from this cor-
roding malady of the mind.

Its effects can readily be imagined. The prisoner
becomes lazy, shiftless, physically and mentally torpid,
generally ineffective and unreliable. From so many
hours spent lying in a trance on his bunk, he even be-
comes physically weak. When he comes out of prison
after years of the stupor, he is likely, after the first
thrill of freedom has worn off, to have a relapse into
the habitual lethargy. He is especially prone to a re-
lapse if conditions in the free community prove un-
satisfying. And because in his self -projections he has
always imagined the future free life to be a life of
absolute comfort and happiness, he is sure to be dis-
appointed in the realities of everyday normal living.
Moreover, his capacity for emotional contacts has
become so atrophied from disuse that a thick shell of
numbness seems to enclose him; he can feel only the
most violent emotions or events. He is thus very badly
handicapped in his efforts at readjustment. His facul-
ties of initiative and mental alertness, his sense of
2}2

PRISON STUPOR
responsibility, are so weak and ineffective that he is
utterly lost in the sharp competition and feverish
tempo of life in the free world. He is fit for little ex-
cept the bread line or the poor farm. This is actually
where many ex-prisoners eventually land. For a time
some of them fortify themselves with liquor and
drugs, and try to spur on their jaded energies in an
effort to maintain themselves; but in the end, if they
have really had a serious siege of the stupor, they are
pretty badly foundered. This is what Warden Lawes
has in mind, I suppose, when he says that no man
who has served more than fifteen years in prison is
normal or fit to be at large. This is also what a con-
vict friend of mine means when he says (and he says
it with utter sincerity) , "The only cure for the likes
of us is to take us out and shoot us!”

Such is the prison stupor. It is an escape mecha-
nism, like drugs or liquor; it is an unconscious flee-
ing from life; it is the mental and emotional reaction so
common among members of the celibate religious
fraternities; and it is based wholly upon an inability to
face the brutal actualities of prison life. As Tannen-
baum points out, the prisoner is so tired of the dull-
ness and misery of To-day that he spends most of his
time in remembered Yesterdays or imagined To-
morrows. It has been very poignantly described in
some letters by a convict named John Sobiesky in the
Atlantic Monthly for September, 15123, which I pre-
sent here in abridged form.

i33

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS

The Case of John Sobiesky

(From an article in the September, 1923, Atlantic Monthly,
by James Bronson Reynolds, [then] President of the Ameri-
can Institute of Criminal Law and Criminology.)

John Sobiesky was, in the words of an unnamed
writer in "The Contributor’s Column”, "a Lithuanian
peasant who came to this country an immigrant with
high purposes and ambitions. He fell into bad com-
pany, for which Mr. Reynolds believes American
social conditions in part responsible, and later, while
half intoxicated and suffering from an epileptic fit,
he killed a man and was sent to State Prison for life.
In his first two years in prison, he learned English
and wrote a series of letters, published in this number
of the Atlantic, which constitute a moving record of
the life of a sensitive mind under prison conditions.”
(I am quoting portions of these letters as valuable
testimony to the damnable effects of "prison stupor”,
which I have tried to describe in the chapter so en-
titled.)

"When he first came to prison, and had recovered
from the shock of trial, conviction, and a sentence
that he be hanged (which was commuted to life im-
prisonment only through the accident of interest
taken in the case by a Protestant clergyman), John
began to study earnestly, and for some time was in a
wholesome frame of mind. Here are portions of his
earlier prison letters, written before the stupor had
stricken him.

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PRISON STUPOR

I wish I could have as much respect for my room as
monk or nun has for his or her own cell. Truly I would
consider my surroundings happy if I could think but for
a moment I am in a cloister instead of prison. I wonder
if the cloister inmates feel similar pangs of despair as the
prisoners are often subjected to bear? I imagine that the
quietness and tranquillity of a cloister life gives more
courage and hope for an eternal life.

Not so very long ago I used to consider myself the center
of the universe, and was inclined to self-pity, consequently
I was more miserable than I should have been. Now when
my eyes are opened I can see and realize that self-pity is
one of the worst traits in a human character, because it
leads to misery the one who indulges in self-pity as well
as to those who come in contact with him. . . . When I
pitied myself and thought my life was a burden to me,
it was so. Now when I think that all is well with me, I
enjoy life from day to day, and my mind gets more
tranquil. I am inclined to believe that there is a good deal
of truth in the teaching of Christian Science. . . .

'"In the following year,’" says Mr. Reynolds, "the
tone of his letters is tragically changed, and we enter
a new phase of his life in the reaction of the prison
cell on both mental and moral enthusiasm.”

I thank you very much for your kind offer to help me
in my studies, writes Sobiesky, but I shall not avail my-
self of your offer, as I have very little ambition left in me,
and my energy seems to be all I have got, the means to
fight my awful circumstances and surroundings. Besides
I think I have intellectual indigestion. I shall read noth-

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS

ing but fiction for a long time to come and of course
about current events whenever I get such reading-matter.

I am afraid that I am getting prison stupor, because I
can remember that I used to derive pleasure as well as
knowledge from my reading and studying, which lately do
not interest me at all. I am inclined to think that society
acts stupid as well as vicious to keep a human being in a
place like this for a long term of years. Of course if the
only reason for imprisonment was punishment, and no
other results looked for, society would find justification in
the cruel laws of *'an eye for an eye”, but from what I
have read on the subject [he had evidently been reading
Osborne], all the law oflScers pretend to send a man to
prison for reformation and reclamation as well as punish-
ment. If they were sincere in that, no man would be kept
in prison more than two years, because all the good resolu-
tions one makes in the first year in prisqn, but after a man
has been here several years he gets discouraged and loses
ambition to better himself, and gets too stupid to learn
anything more than he learned in the first couple of
years. . . .

I come in contact here with all sorts of peoples; some
of them have been here a good many years, while others
are in their first or second year, and invariably those who
haven’t been here so long are the most intelligent as well
as the most pleasant peoples to speak to. My friend of
which I have spoken to you before, went home few months
ago. Perhaps if he had been locked up years instead of
months, his amiability and general disposition may not
have been so good as I found it, though I think that he
would have proved the exception to the rule.

I earnestly wish that I could comply with your sugges-
236

PRISON STUPOR

tion in regards to taking a course in agriculture. But I am
sorry to be compelled to inform you that I have decided
not to study any more, not from laziness, but, because no
matter how hard I may try, I find myself unable to con-
centrate my mind on any unfamiliar subject. I have felt
that way during the last eight months. As I have men-
tioned to you in one of my letters formerly, I think that
I have acquired a state of mind that is known here as
prison stupor. Some men are affected only temporarily
while with others it remains for years. I trust I shall get
over my indisposition very soon, and feel once more, as
formerly, actual pleasure and delight in acquiring useful
knowledge. At present any study would be a hard task for
me and to no purpose. . . .

These last letters show with cruel clarity the demoral-
izing, disintegrating, atrophying powers of the
dreaded prison stupor.

I expect — or hope — to reach you with this through
the ‘'subway.’’ [The letter has been smuggled out uncen-
sored, in other words.] I feel my heart so full, and I want
to confide to someone, someone that will understand as I
seem to be misunderstood by one and all! It is most un-
fortunate as well as sad for me to make an admission that
my condition here grows daily less bearable, and God only
knows how long shall I be able to endure! I am so much
weakened by long confinement and my vitality is at such
a low ebb. In a word I cease to feel any longer any en-
thusiasm or charm that life incites in every living being.
It is all due beyond any doubt to the deplorable conditions
in which we are forced to exist. It is really an tmbelievable

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS

occurrence to me that in this so much talked of land of
freedom and in an era of brotherhood of man there exists
such human monsters that rejoice and gloat in satisfaction
while inflicting unbearable sufferings upon unfortunate
convicts, his fellow men after all, and does not fed no
moral shame or pangs of conscience of the dastardly acts
he commits. We are fed upon decayed victuals no health
authorities on the outside would sanction. [The point here
is that they have been sanctioned by outside health au-
thorities and inspectors. V.F.N.] It is not only that our
bodies are run down but even our mental make-up, our
minds and thoughts are poisoned by a long and continu-
ous process of innutrition and there is no getting out of it.
I read somewhere that it says there are no prisons for one^s
thoughts or mind, but yet, I found out different! I found
it out that your mind, your very thought, can be poisoned
or stupefied by bad nourishment of your body by chronic
innutrition and there you are in prison both mind and
body and no getting away. [Note: this reiteration of the
''getting away” idea is significant in view of the fact that
Sobiesky shortly hereafter escaped entirely into the world
of dreams and unreality and went insane.] ... I am left
no better than the physical wreck. I can’t sleep at nights,
I can’t eat that rotten food they give me here, it won’t
go through my stomach. I got those nervous jumps, and I
lose control upon my nerves at the slightest disturbance.
I can’t stand no slurring and all kinds of insulting remarks
that I have been hearing from these insolent convicts here,
those especially that is known in most all the prisons as
"moral degenerates.” I wonder if you’ll understand what
I mean? It is awfully sad to what depths of degradation
such people have fallen. There are hundreds of them, who
238

PRISON STUPOR

are abusing their own nature and who are priding them-
seifs in being the subject of alleviating other men’s pas-
sions. I hate them. I hate them, I shun them, and they in
turn hate me and tell the oflScials here all kinds of lies
about me, that I am no good — or rather bad man and
dangerous because I tell them to keep away from me or
ril hurt them if they persist in their immoral purpose.
Officials like them from the lowest up, and believe them,
and there is no chance whatever of getting a square deal.
When a man is run down, when his nerves are worn out
and he becomes easily irritable, the honorable warden and
Dr. pronounce him dangerous man, not reformed, and
therefore must rot in jail, whereas in better conditions
such man could be straightened out, nursed back to life
and to amiability of temper. However, they don’t look in
that way. Their object is not to reform a man but to de-
form him for life — it costs nothing, deny him food, deny
him medical attention, let him die by inches, they care
none . • .

After another letter or two, which need not be
quoted, here is the final effect of imprisonment upon
John Sobiesky, as related by Mr. Reynolds.

^^The failure of the Lithuanian Society to secure
his freedom proved a final body-blow to John. It
seemed a declaration that he was doomed to spend all
his life in prison. The prison stupor and depression
which John himself recorded were followed by other
mental and emotional weakening. [Not necessarily;
merely the continuing effects of the stupor are enough
to account for what happened. V.F.N.] He became

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
gloomy, then suspicious, and finally violent. Two
weeks before the visitor came to tell John that freedom
was hopefully near, he was sent to a state asylum for
the criminally insane. There he will probably remain
imtil he dies.”

There is thus nothing new about this case. Its visible
effects, on the contrary, had been noted even in the
days of Chaucer!

' (“With raw-boned cheeks
and hollow eyes forspent,
as if he had been
long in prison pent.”)

Its present significance, however, is far greater
than it was in the days of Chaucer. With crime ramp-
ant, with hundreds of thousands of criminals an-
nually emerging from places of detention, most of
them affected by prison stupor, it is high time that
the traditional something was done about it. It is
hard to see, though, how under present systems of
prison management the convict can help falling prey
to the disease. In the prison environment there is
simply nothing which challenges his active interest
or spurs him on to an energetic attempt at rehabilita-
tion. We all of us know that the active, busy person
has no time to develop neuroses. Imprisonment as it
exists to-day, however, does not keep the prisoner
very busy at anything except killing time. It gives
him no chance to live, and it is for this reason that
he seeks escape, consciously or unconsciously, in the
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PRISON STUPOR
palpitating life of the dream world. There is simply
no incentive to normal activity for the prisoner. The
rare convict who has intelligent, thoughtful, devoted
friends to help and encourage him, can partly or al-
most wholly maintain an active interest in Ufe and
thus is able to fight off the initial attacks of prison
stupor — if his term is not too long. If it is, then no
matter how loyal his friends are, or how intelligent
he may be, he is likely to be driven by sheer discontent
and dissatisfaction into the prison paralysis. Even
guards and other prison officials get a touch of it, un-
less their outside activities are such as to give them a
reasonably satisfying, well-rounded life.

In the way of suggested remedies for this disease of
the prison, all I can offer are the following: Unless
the prisoner is given plenty of fresh air and wholesome
exercise in the open, a variety of appetizing food; a
diversity of social, mental and emotional contacts
through visits, entertainments, and the like; normal
sexual intercourse at reasonable intervals; interesting
work of a vocational type; competent guards to act
as teachers and leaders of inmate study groups and
other inmate activities; in a phrase, unless some mean-
ing is given to his daily life — prison stupor can
never be eliminated from the prison environment.
Intelligent penologists are aware of this; but they
have always been hampered in their attempts to
change the prison environment by the loud and un-
intelligent protests of ignorant laymen who have not
the faintest knowledge of the complex factors in-

241

PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
volved in the problem of crime and punishment. It
is of vital importance, however, if society really wishes
to carry out successfully her plan to reform criminals,
to stamp out this malevolent cancer. It is, in a word,
the most deadly of the many ill effects of imprison-
ment upon the human being.

The prisoner, surely, is not to be blamed for seek-
ing the only escape at hand. He is more or less likely,
situated as he is, to feel (in the words of A. E. Hous-
man) that

**Iniquity indeed it is on high
To cheat our sentenced souls of aught they crave.

To mar the merriment as you and I

Fare on om: long Fool’s Errand to the grave.”

No, it is not to the prisoner that society should
look for the elimination of prison stupor. This is the
problem of the penologist who dictates the adminis-
trative policy of the prison. It is strictly up to him
to do something about a condition which is the chief
contribution of the prison to Society.

24Z

Chapter XI

The Freedom of the Convalescent

jAlT a prison camp where I spent several months, I
once witnessed a minor tragedy. A convict, who was
also something of an amateur trapper and woodsman,
caught a rabbit, which he planned to cook and eat
as soon as he got a chance, and had been keeping it
caged up in an old packing case in which there were
only a few small air holes. An oflScial found out about
this, forbade him to make a stew of the creature, and
ordered him to turn it loose. The man decided to
have what he considered some fun with the animal,
perhaps thus thinking to avenge himself upon it for
its luck in having escaped from the stew pot. . . .

Taking it out of the packing case, he held the
frightened, bewildered creature in his arms, while
two of his pals who had been "in” on the stew each
held a straining, angry tomcat. (I was busily minding
my own business.) There had been some talk about
the relative sprinting abilities of cats and rabbits, and
they now planned to settle the little dispute. Since to

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
be able to “run like a jack rabbit” was an ancimt
rifnile for frantic speed, the concensus of opinion was
that the rabbit would easily outdistance the cats. At
the agreed-upon signal, the cats and the rabbit were
simultaneously set free. Much to our surprise, how-
ever, instead of racing away in a cotton-tailed flurry
of flying legs, the rabbit merely snifled the air for a
second, looked about in search of orienting land-
marks, and then began to lope ofl in a most lethargic
and ungainly manner. The two tomcats, moreover,
proved equally disappointing (they were disgrace-
fully well-fed cats) . They did not even glance at the
rabbit, but scurried off in opposite directions, their
tails flat with ruffled dignity. . . .

But the rabbit did not get away. There was a young
kitten looking on with the greatest interest. When the
rabbit started loping off, and the tomcats bounded
away and left her a clear field, the kitten fairly flew
to the kill — her very first kill, too, by the way. In
three or four wing-footed strides she had the slow-
moving rabbit by the neck. . . .

At first I was puzzled by the nightmarish quality
of the rabbit’s movements: why had it not raced off
at once for the safety of the near-by shrubbery? Then
I saw the why of it all. Accustomed to freedom, the
luckless creature had been confined for several days
in a box so small that it gave her barely room enough
to turn around in; and the box had been kept in the
boiler room, where the air was always tainted by
gases from the soft-coal fires. It had been cramped and
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enthralled until its muscles had lost their habitual
tension. It had been practically drugged by even the
small quantity of tainted air it had been able to
breathe in through the air holes. . . . Small wonder,
I decided, that it had fared so badly when suddenly
thrust out into the ruthless competitive freedom of
the animal world.

Thus also with the ex-convict: for the first thing
which must be said about him is that he is essentially
the newly liberated animal. In thus describing him,
it is not my purpose to imply that he is of a lower
order than the rest of humanity. After all, we are
all of us animals. I speak of the ex-convict in these
terms simply because that is the closest I can come to
stating an important truth about his condition at the
time of his release from prison. He is at that particular
moment nothing quite so much as he is the human
animal suddenly turned out of the cage.

"Christ!” one hears it said by ex-convicts with the
fervency of prayer and the frequency of automobile
accidents. "Do you know what I feel like? I feel
hke I’d just been taken out of a strait- jacket. I just
don’t feel human. I’m afraid to walk or to try to
cross the street in the traffic. I’m afraid to walk faster
than a slow mope, for fear some screw will step up
and grab me and say, 'No running allowed in this
yard!’ Will I ever feel human again?”

A newly freed squirrel (to change the figure of
speech) , would scarcely be expected to remain dazed
and upon the ground. Sooner or later it would surely

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
hiirl itself in a bewildering spiral up the trunk of the
nearest tree and disappear in a headlong flurry of fur
and leaves among the very topmost greenery — un-
less the cage has been too small and the squirrel too
long confined in it.

A tendency toward a similar excess of activity
(blind, irrational, uncontrollable) is likewise to be
noted in the freed man’s first reaction to freedom. He
is in an ecstatic holiday mood. The ordeal of imprison-
ment has been endured: behind him are misery, re-
straint, monotony, starvation (intestinal, emotional,
sexual) : before him is an abundance of food, drink,
liquor, women, joy, freedom and life.

The sudden transition from imprisonment to lib-
erty is all but indescribable. It can be compared with
nothing else that I have experienced in life. It is some-
what like coming up to the surface after years of
slavery in the foulest depths of a coal mine. The very
air is like old wine, the goodly sunshine too won-
drously dazzling to be endured. The world is green
and fresh and crystal clear: a flowery, glistening
meadow stricken through with the brilliant sunlight
which follows an April shower. ... It is partly like
stepping down to earth after hours in the air: the
ground is strange and infirm, and the suddenly dimin-
ished perspectives give an air of almost cubistic un-
reality to trees and buildings and planes. ... It is
also a bit like coming out of the ether after an opera-
tion: one sees and hears and feels and even speaks,
however irrationally; but the senses are blurred and
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one feels the lingering clutch of the drug-distorted
world out of which one is laboriously climbing. . . .
The transition from imprisonment to freedom is
somewhat like all of these things, but it is an incom-
parably more vital experience.

The most significant trait of the newly released
prisoner is that he is the human being who has suf-
fered and who has resolved to obtain some compensa-
tion for his suffering. Whether or not he has deserved
to suffer, and whether or not Society has succeeded in
the Gilbertian plan of "making the punishment fit
the crime”, need not concern us now. It certainly
does not concern the ex-convict. All he knows is that
he has suffered: that he has gone through a gruelling
ordeal, that something or somebody, somehow, must
make amends.

At this point a parenthetical digression seems neces-
sary. It seems to me vastly important to establish the
fact that the ex-prisoner has suffered. If I appear to
be laboring what must to every intelligent person be
an obvious fact, I refer the reader to to-day’s (any
day’s) daily paper, or to this month’s (any month’s)
average periodical. It is all but impossible to pick up
a copy of one or the other without running across a
story or editorial to the effect that the convicts are
being grossly pampered and sentimentally coddled.
. . . This is a difficult topic for me to write about.
Not only have I myself felt the lash, and might there-
fore be a somewhat prejudiced critic; but I have
grown positively purple with passion on numerous

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
occasions when, cursing my luck in a stone-walled,
iron-barred little hole of a cell, I have run across
articles in which it was maintained that the prisoner
was being glutted with luxurious food and fairly
stunned with riotous entertainment. . . .

My emotions prompt me to take a revengeful crack,
not only at those officials of law and order who were
instrumental in making my ordeal harsh and hateful,
but also at those uninformed critics who, never hav-
ing served a single day of imprisonment, nevertheless
feel competent to evaluate the ordeal of the im-
prisoned man. But I do not follow the promptings of
my emotions in this regard: for I am not merely a
body which feels, but a mind which attempts to
think: and my mind tells me that both the cruel
official and the ignorant critic are the victims, in vary-
ing degree, of the same stupid, wasteful social system
under which I have suffered. . . .

Nevertheless, it needs to be said that, although bru-
tality has been made illegal, and is therefore not prac-
tised as a matter of official policy, it has by no means
been stamped out. The point is, that at present the
brutality has changed from the physical to the psy-
chical type — in the main. That even physical brutal-
ity still persists, however, is easily demonstrable. For
example, in to-day’s paper (in which there is also a
quoted speech in which some publicist bemoans the
coddUng of the criminal) you may read (July 17,
1932) that a prisoner was beaten to death by New
York police officials; and you may also read that in a
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Georgia prison camp a negro prisoner was likewise
beaten to death. I could go on for quite a time citing
instances of official brutality which I have seen, ex-
perienced, or been told about by convict friends; but
a perusal of the papers of the date mentioned ought
to convince the thinking reader that brutality still
exists (in a highly reduced form as compared with
fifty or a hundred years ago) but is not heard of by
the general public unless, as occasionally happens,
some luckless prisoner succumbs and dies.

Any person who has suffered, who has been men-
tally, emotionally or physically hurt, has a natural
tendency to seek relief. The burnt child runs to
mother. The beaten and kicked dog runs whimpering
to its kennel, seeking safety, concealment, and relief
from present pain. All animals, brute or human, have
this tendency to give way to self-pity, to whimper, to
seek concealment and cessation of suffering. In a word,
to find comfort for the wounded ego.

The result of years of suffering on the part of the
prisoner has made this tendency so strong within him
that he is not merely the wounded animal in search
of temporary relief. He is the animal which has been
hurt so badly, and suffered so long, that (in the case
of long-termers or recidivists) he has a neurosis of
which the chief obsession is that life owes him com-
pensation for the suffering he has endured. The acts
of the newly freed criminal will never be fully under-
stood until this highly significant state of mind is
taken into account. For this motivating force with

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the impulse toward excessive, irrational activity, is
a sick man’s dream and thus most likely to frustrate
the ex-convict’s efforts at readjustment in the free
world.

To put it bluntly, this means that in looking for-
ward, for years, to a life of unalloyed happiness which
life owes him, the prisoner has been industriously
storing up grim disappointment for himself. He neg-
lects too many vitally important facts; such as, that
the joys and sorrows of this world (especially the joys)
stubbornly refuse to fall in with even the most care-
fully laid mortal plans; and that dreams are danger-
ous for exactly the reason that their failure to come
true breeds grief and discouragement.

It goes without saying, of course, that the ex-
convict is wrong in expecting any recompense from
Society, or from life itself, merely because he happens
to have suffered. All men suffer. (Was it Conrad who
wrote, as a biography of the human race, "They were
born, they suffered, and they died”?) After all, from
Society’s point of view, the criminal has merely en-
dured the ptmishment he deserves because of his
breach of faith with the community.

This irrational and dangerous attitude of the ex-
convict is based almost entirely upon the unsatisfied
htmgers and repressed desires of the long-imprisoned
hiunan animal. It is the result of wants and needs
finding expression in a blend of self-pity, and mad
hunger, and revenge. Since, however, it is the post-
prison state of mind of nine out of ten ex-convicts
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FREEDOM OF CONVALESCENT
(I assure you that this £gure is not too high), and
largely governs their post-prison conduct, it is an
item in the problem of crime and punishment which
the penologists will do well to study.

So much, at present, for the mental-emotional side
of the situation; now to come down to the earthy,
financial situation. The ex-convict’s state of mind
would not matter so very much if he had enough
money to provide himself with the kind of life to
which he feels himself “entitled” after the prison ex-
perience. Unluckily both for him and for Society,
however, the average ex-convict has barely enough
money to buy himself a decent suit of clothes, much
less to indulge in an orgy of rich living. Although the
man has worked in the prison shop for years and
years (and I am not forgetting the balancing fact that
in some prisons he is paid a pittance for his work),
the prison will not provide him with a decent “going-
out outfit.” In no institution in which I have served
time have I seen a going-out suit which was fit to be
seen in. As a convict friend once remarked, “Wear-
ing that outfit, a guy might just as well hang a sign
around his neck saying, T’ve just come out of the
can!’ ”

Many a prisoner comes out into the free world en-
tirely devoid of money, a home, a job, or influential
friends. Especially is this true of the long-termer and
the recidivist: the professional criminal. With the ac-
cidental, circumstantial criminal it is not usually so
bad. He generally has a home, friends, former em-

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ploycrs to help him. Occasionally he can even get his
old job back again. But for the long-termer and the
reci^vist, the situation is unqualifiedly bad. They
have been in and out of places of detention for years.
Friends and employers have lost faith in them —
quite understandably. They can, and usually do, go
back to whatever old underworld friends and places
are still in existence at the moment of release. In fact,
they are practically obliged to go there. Where else
are they to go? Old friends have died or scattered
about the earth during the long prison years, so that
very often the ex-convict has a hard time finding
even his friends of the underworld. In that case —
alone, friendless, broke, too vain to appeal to charity,
too much obsessed with the idea that the world owes
him a temporary life of joy — what is he going to do,
except steal?

It often happens that during the prison years un-
derworld pals have kept him supplied with money.
He comes out of prison, therefore, under obligation
to these men, who are still "out on the racket.” Not
that many of them would not tell him to forget the
debt. As one of them said, "Listen, pal; if you want
to go straight, and all that’s bothering you is the
five C’s you owe me — hell! just forget about them
and go right ahead.” On the other hand, there is an
unwritten underworld law to the efiect that such
debts should be promptly repaid; and the average
ex-convict feels that his first extramural duty is to
go out and get the money with which to repay them;

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he is thus immediately driven to crime. And in cer-
tain rackets involving numbers of men (the various
"mobs”) , in which killings have taken place, it is dan-
gerous for him to break away and try to "go straight.”
Not that the fellow members of the mob object to
his clearing out; but the mere fact of his wanting to
"go straight” implies an awakening respect for law
and order which may later result in his betrayal of
mob secrets and thus jeopardize the life or liberty of
the other mobsters.

Suppose, though, that the ex-convict has no obli-
gations of these kinds: that he is merely a penniless,
friendless man in search of an honest job. At the
present moment, when millions of relatively law-
abiding men are out of work, it may seem a bit of
pathos to comment on the fact that the ex-convict
has a diflScult time finding work. But it is really just
as important that the ex-convict who desires to live
an honest life should find work as that the average
jobless non-criminal citizen should do so. The aver-
age jobless citizen goes to the charitable organizations,
or to friends, and manages to tide himself over, after
a fashion. At all events he will not usually resort to
crime: and this is exactly what the average ex-convict
will do if he wants work and cannot find it. (The
job-seeking ex-convict is also a great problem to the
parole boards: what are they to do with the man? His
time has expired; they must let him go free; and
there he is, in a jobless world, a grave menace to the
lives and property of free citizens.) Realize how hard

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his lot is. For even when he diligently seeks work,
he is disastrously handicapped: he can give no refer-
ences, he belongs to no unions which might help him,
there are years of his life for which he cannot truth-
fully account. Thus handicapped he is driven to lies
and evasions which make him self-conscious and em-
barrassed — and this certainly does not aid him in his
effort to make a good impression on a prospective
employer.

And suppose that he does, in spite of these obstacles,
manage to get a job. I cite the case of a certain Martin
O’Leary. I met him on the street one day and said,
"Hello, Marty — how’re things?”

"Things is lousy!” said Martin. "Not to give you
a short answer, or anything; but they’re simply
lousy!”

"Why, I’m surprised to hear that, Marty. I heard
you had a good job over at Hood’s and were doing
fine.”

"Yeah,” said Martin, "I did have a job. I was doin’
fine. . . . Look! I’ll tell you what happened. I’m
walking along the street one day — I’m out to get a
bite to eat, at noon — and who do I run into but

that stinkin’ of a dick (detective) Kelley. Jesus,

Mary and Joseph! ... An Irishman, if you can tie
that! He says to me, *An’ what are you doing in
town, O’Leary?’ I says, T’m workin’ over at Hood’s.’
'Yes, you are,’ says he, sarcastic like. 'If you’re work-
ing over to Hood’s it’ll be at night, with a jimmy and
a can-opener.’ 'No, Kelley,’ says I. 'Honest to God,
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FREEDOM OF CONVALESCENT
I am workin’ there. Call ’em up and ask ’em if you
don’t believe me.’ I tried to convince him that I was
goin’ straight; but you know how us Irish are —
when we’re thick, we’re very thick. Finally he says,

* All right, me b’y, I will call them up — and if you
ain’t working there, you better not run into me again
on the streets, for I’ll run you right out of town.’ And
with that he walks away and I goes down and gets
a bite to eat. Well, I comes back at one o’clock, and
— lo and behold! — there’s my boss waiting for me
with a pay envelope in his hand. T’m sorry, Martin,’
he says to me, 'but there was a detective in here a
little while ago, and he must have told them some-
thing bad about you up front, because they’ve sent
me down your pay and told me we don’t require your
services any longer.’ . . . So,” said Marty, "that’s
why I say things is lousy!”

“That was a pretty rotten thing for him to do,”
I said. "He could have minded his own business when
he found you really were working at Hood’s. But
after all, I suppose he was merely doing his duty as
he saw it and incidentally doing Society a bit of
harm.”

"A bit of harm, says you!” Martin looked at me
with that menacing look which startled citizens
would soon be meeting behind a leveled gun. "Listen,
kid. I’m going to give them a real 'crime wave’ in this
State. I try to go straight and what the hell do they
do to me? You just read the papers from now on and
just remember that old Marty’s out settlin’ with this

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here Society!” And with that he gave me a bitter
smile and walked away.

Take another example, Al Garfillio, who came out
of Sing Sing after serving fifteen years for man-
slaughter. A hard-boiled gangster who had spent most
of his life on the streets of New York, he was in such
a stupor when he came out that he was afraid to cross
the automobile-infested streets of his native city.
Within six months he had become so disgusted with
his own inability to readjust himself to normal active
living that he began drinking and soon went all to
pot. Arrested for a stupid killing in a Long Island rum
feud, he was sent back to Sing Sing with a sixty-year
term. . . . There was Jimmy Swinnerton, who un-
expectedly got a pardon while serving two consecu-
tive twenty-year terms for highway robbery. While
in prison Jimmy had for a few years studied and
endeavored to make himself capable of earning an
honest living when he should be released. On being
pardoned, he secured work as secretary for an in-
surance man. He had become so accustomed to living
in a semicataleptic state, however, that he could not
stand the rush and bustle of active city fife. He began
to use drugs, to give him the Dutch courage he needed
in order to keep active. Drugs cost money and so
Jimmy began to steal occasionally. He was arrested
one night when he had a gun in his pocket, and now
he is serving out the thirty-two year balance of his
terms. ... I could cite any number of other cases;
but I have, I believe, sufficiently indicated the nature
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of the post-prison effects of the stupor. In a word,
it is the greatest handicap which faces the ex-convict
who desires to reorganize his life on a sound basis.

I do not say that Martin O’Leary’s case, or Gar-
fillio’s and Swinnerton’s are the rule; but neither are
they the exception. In one case it may be a detective
who betrays his secret; in another a busybody or a
personal enemy; just as often he betrays himself, but
it is certainly an incident which typifies one feature
of the ex-convict’s life. It may be asked, why did not
O’Leary himself and at the start apprise his employer
of this vital fact about himself? The answer is, that
much as we pride ourselves on our tolerance, the day
has not yet arrived when, in any but the highest or
the lowest circles, those above respectability and those
below it, the ex-convict is acceptable either as an
employee or as a member of society. Most people are
highly tolerant in the abstract toward ex-convicts,
prostitutes, and other declasse individuals; but when
it comes down to the actual business of practising
their avowed beliefs, that is quite another story. . . .

Let us now consider another trait of the average
ex-convict which is of great significance. Without
his knowledge or volition (except in extremely rare
cases) , he has the tendency to revert to previous states
of living, or of development. In this connection it
must be borne in mind that in prison the social, mental
and emotional development of the criminal has been
sharply arrested. As previously stated, the paucity
of social, mental, sexual and emotional contacts pre-

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
vents the young prisoner from achieving maturity,
and prevents the further growth of even the older
one. (The average prisoner of to-day is so young that
it is wise, for the moment, to consider the problem
from fhis point of view.) He comes out of prison,
therefore, pretty much the same callow, immature
person he was when he entered, with the additional
handicap of having suffered a partial or total in-
capacitation or at least a weakening of his powers of
adequate response to stimuli. Not only that, but in
his raging hunger for the woman, he has inevitably
raised her to a place of exaggerated importance in
life: so much so that in the initial grip of his lust
he is almost ready to grovel at her feet, helpless in
the face of her power to appease his wild desire. Un-
able to face her unself -consciously, he is obliged to
hide his passion behind a smirking mask of hypocrisy.

Worse yet, although he thinks of life and people
as they were in the pre-prison years, the world and
the persons in it have greatly changed. He finds, too,
that he himself has greatly changed. For although he
feels the same youthful needs and hungers, he finds
himself unable to feel the same responses. He is over-
whelmed by a sense of futility, of loss, of being out
of touch with persons, events, life. It is partly a
poignant nostalgia for the old days and an over-
whelming regret for the lost years, the wasted youth:
the unrecoverable wastes and losses of the prison
years. He finds himself enswathed in layers of numb-
ness caused by malnutrition and prison stupor: he
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FREEDOM OF CONVALESCENT
cannot feel anything except the most violent and ex-
citing emotions or events or people. In his uncon-
scious efforts to free his body and spirit of this coating
of numbness (anhedonia, as Doctor Myerson calls it
in his splendid paper on that subject) , he will plunge
himself and his friends into the most outrageously im-
possible situations (so strong is the unconscious urge
to make his presence felt, to convince himself and his
friends that he is actually alive). All of which helps
to explain why it is that the average ex-convict, still
in the clutch of prison stupor, seeks to pierce the an-
hedonic fog with artificial stimulations; drugs, fiery
liquors, passionate women, the noisy, glittering gaiety
of night clubs and speak-easies. To do this, of course,
requires money. Usually penniless, but usually deter-
mined also to have the fling for which he has lusted so
long, the average ex-convict may react in some of the
following ways.

He may feel so cheated of the joys to which he has
looked forward, so angry at the failure of life to
compensate him for the ordeal of imprisonment, that
he will turn like a hounded fox upon the environment
which frustrates and badgers him and seek revenge
at the point of a gun. I have heard any number of ex-
convicts say (and they so nearly use the same words
that it is practically a pattern) : "Listen! You know
what prison is. You’ve been in the can yourself. You
know what a man’s up against when he comes out.
I don’t have to tell you. . . . Well, here’s the way
it is. I went through hell for seven years. I hardly drew

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
a comfortable breath the whole time I was there. I
got lousy food, a stuffy cell, a rotten job where I
couldn’t even learn a trade, and had to take a lot of
cheap crap from a lot of half-witted screws (guards)
who wouldn’t even dare to speak to me on the street,
let alone try to bully me — not out here, where it’d
be man to man. All right. I went through all that
torture. For what? For stealing a few lousy bucks
from some rich bastard that’s got as many dimes as
Rockefeller. Even if it’s wrong to steal — everybody
does it, judges and all; and what about guys like Sin-
clair, who had Martin Littleton and a few million
bucks to keep him from going to prison — even if
it’s wrong to steal, that doesn’t give the dirty bastards
the right to keep me cooped up like a dog for seven
years, half starved, never seeing a woman, never hav-
ing a chance to live. Well, by Christ, Vm going to
live now! And I don’t give a good goddam where I get
the money to pay for my fun — only, somebody’s
going to pay, believe me. If any of them lousy screws
had anything worth stealing, I’d certainly love to
make them pay for it. But anyhow. I’m going to make
up for those seven years. They ain’t going to use me
like a yellow dog for seven years and get away with
it. No sir. They’ve had their laugh. Now I’ll have mine
— at their expense — and we’ll see who laughs the
loudest, or the longest, or the last.”

He may break down completely out of sheer dis-
appointment and a sense of the futility of all effort,
and fall prey to a most fearful inferiority-martyr
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complex, taking flight into the prison stupor in which
(consciously or unconsciously) he sought refuge dur-
ing the prison years. I have seen such men: puling,
whining, altogether weak and inadequate, their spirits
broken by imprisonment and the inability to achieve
readjustment. I have heard them say, "Jeeze, what can
a guy do? They’s no work, and a guy can’t take a
chance gettin’ pinched under the Baumes Laws. If he’s
an ex-con they’ll throw the whole book at him and
bury him for life.” Beaten, defeated by circumstances,
these men are likely to become derelicts and drifters,
eventually to land in institutions for habitual drunks,
drug addicts, and other misfits who have to be sup-
ported by the long-suffering taxpayers.

Or he may become so egregiously dissatisfied with
the new environment (which is uncomforting and
embarrassing, which frustrates his desire for sexual
pleasure and rich living) that he will commit crimes,
even when he has a very sincere desire to reform,
which are unconsciously motivated by a desire to re-
turn to the prison environment. This, at first glance,
may seem incredible ; but I am sure that a more care-
ful consideration of it will reveal its fundamental
truth. The ex-convict, let us say, finds himself unable
to get work; he will not hit the bread lines; without
money, he cannot keep up even the pretence of re-
spectability which is necessary if he is to delude his
immediate associates, who know nothing about his
prison record. This makes fife dissatisfying, incom-
plete, humiliating. In the new world he has no place,

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no security, no reputation. What he seeks when un-
consciously desiring to return to the prison environ-
ment is, not the hateful cell, not the stuffy shop, but
the feeling of security, of safety, of freedom from the
stress and strain of a life he finds too difficult. He seeks
the old world to which he had become stuporously ac-
customed, in which he had a meager but definite
place, a reputation, friends of his own kind, and those
other things in life which help to bolster up the droop-
ing ego.

The ex-convict, thus, is essentially the convalescent.
Prison stupor, as I have tried to show in another chap-
ter, is a very real and dangerous disease. Its deplor-
able after-effects — bodily and spiritual anemia and
atrophy, anhedonia — are not to be thrown off in a
few weeks or months. In fact, I doubt if any man
who has served even five years in prison will ever
succeed in fully getting free of its griping clutch.
The newly liberated prisoner, therefore, is like any
patient just out of a hospital: he is weak and in-
effectual — a convalescent. He is able to go through
the less complicated motions and gestures of living,
but there is actually very little life and strength in his
devitalized, desire-torn body. He is a hollow shell, a
fuel-less engine. To revert to the original metaphor:
the animal suddenly freed after long captivity will
need a great deal of time and exercise before it re-
covers anything like the full use of its various facul-
ties.

A case in point is that of Alfred Sperry, which I
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FREEDOM OF CONVALESCENT
heard from a woman who had befriended him. I give
it in her own words.

"Alfred Sperry,” she said, “came down here six
months ago. He was like a wild man. I had expected
him to be excited and nervous; but he was — well,
he was just wild! He couldn’t sit down in a chair and
stay there for longer than a few seconds. 'What’s the
matter, AI?’ I asked him. 'Can’t you get yourself in
hand?’ He said, 'Look here, Linda; I’m simply fever-
ish. I can’t stay here talking with you or I’ll lose con-
trol completely. You know that I love you, Linda;
but I’m in no condition to come near you or any de-
cent woman. But I’ve got to have a woman, and get
blind drunk. I can’t tell you why, or say anything
more about it; but there’s the way it is with me,
Linda.’ I hardly knew what to say. But I was in love
with him too. So I said, 'Al, you can sleep with me
to-night, if it’s that way with you.’ He gave a
strangled sob. 'My God, Linda; that would be a prof-
anation, a sacrilege, a contamination. I feel like some
monstrous, misshapen, lustful beast — oh, I couldn’t
have you see me like that. Good-by for a while, dear;
I’ll get in touch with you when I get myself under
control, if I ever do.’ And with that he fairly ran out
of the oflSce. I didn’t hear anything from him again
— but about two weeks later I learned that he had
been picked up, in a coma, along side some highway
and taken to a hospital. From there he was transferred
to the State Insane Hospital. . . . That’s what im-
prisonment did for Alfred Sperry.”

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS

This, of course, is an extremely rare instance. It
goes to show, however, how deadly are the after-
effects of prison stupor and tends to prove that the
ex-prisoner is a great deal like a convalescent who has
been long abed. Allowances should be made for a per-
son in that condition. His best qualities have been so
fearfully warped and maimed that he is simply not
capable of competing on even terms with his fellows
in the free world. The powers of concentration and
coordination, which he so urgently needs in the
sharply competitive free world, have been atrophied
from disuse almost to the vanishing point: he is in the
grip of a malady which prevents him from function-
ing in an effective manner. He is like the proverbial
fish out of water, helpless in the bewildering emer-
gencies of a new and strange environment.

Against the case of Alfred Sperry may be set down
the more comforting case of John Crawford. He was
particularly fortunate. Although he had no wealthy
parents, no money of his own, he had made the friend-
ship (while in prison) of a very intelligent, under-
standing man. When John first came out, he im-
mediately began drinking and frequenting bawdy
houses, and in general conducting himself like a mad-
man. Without his friend, he must surely have been
lost. The firm loyalty of his friend may have wavered,
but it did not break. He showed so much understand-
ing, so much generosity, never berating John (except
in the friendliest possible way), that eventually he
was able to save him. After blowing off steam in
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FREEDOM OF CONVALESCENT
every conceivable way for several months, John
eventually came down to earth, buckled down to
work, and is to-day self-sustaining, a source of great
pride to the friend who had not only believed in him,
but stood by him throughout the crisis. . . .

All this may, I hope, help to explain why it is that
at least two out of three ex-convicts of the state
prison type (most of them of the longer term or re-
cidivist type) eventually come back to prison, or at
any rate fail to achieve anything like an adequate re-
habilitation. Aside from the economic factors in-
volved (poverty, unemployment, inability to furnish
references, lack of effective agencies for post -prison
resocialization, and the like) ; aside from the psycho-
logical aspects of the problem (the feeling of in-
feriority, disgrace, strangeness, prison stupor; the real
or imagined contempt of Society) ; aside frcrni these
considerations, there are other circumstances of im-
portance. One of these is the conflict between the ex-
convict’s idea of liberty and Society’s.

In his admirable article on "Law, Liberty and Prog-
ress,” in the Yale Quarterly Review, April, 1926,
Henry W. Farnam writes:

Liberty, especially personal liberty, makes a strong ap-
peal to all of us, because we are all selfish, and the term
personal liberty means to each of us the liberty to do what
suits his personal tastes. But our Constitution was not
adopted to secure absolute liberty. With the felicity of
diction which marks this wonderful document it aims to
secure "the blessings of liberty.” If liberty is to be a bless-

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS

ing, and not a curse, it mxist be a liberty which subserves,
not the crude egotism of the individual, but the “general
welfare.” It must be a liberty promoting civilized progress
under the restraints of law.

The ex-prisoner, unfortunately, is not interested
in a "liberty under the restraints of law”, but in a
“liberty to do what suits his personal tastes”; and
thus a conflict arises between the aims of the ex-
convict and the aims of Society, which, in the long
run, is as bad for Society as it is for the ex-convict.

There is the situation. In spite of the anemic con-
dition in which he is sent out of prison and into the
free world, the ex-convict is nevertheless expected to
rehabilitate himself. The task which faces him is one
before which even a strong man might tremble with
doubt. And the ex-convict, alas, is rarely a strong
man, and more rarely has he the help of strong men.
Let me say this: the freed man rarely enlists the help
of men; more often a woman is ready to help, but
women cannot understand the futile furor which is
unleashed. Appalled, they lose their hold, whereas a
man, who knows the kind of hunger and fear which
beset the ex-convict, might land him as the angler
lands the trout, by playing him with a strong but
elastic line until the rage subsides.

All the circvimstances which I have meagerly
sketched constitute the towering barrier which bars
the onward march of the ex-convict who desires to
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FREEDOM OF CONVALESCENT
rehabilitate himself. The more intelligent he is, the
surer he is to realize the magnitude of the task which
confronts him and to retreat before the prospect of
futile struggle which it is bound to entail. He is very
apt to fall back upon the cynical philosophy (sophis-
try, rather) of the prison yard and say to himself:
"What’s the use! Under these conditions I’d be lucky
to be able to earn even a bare living, honestly; and if
I slaved for the rest of my life, at current wages. I’d
never have enough money to enjoy life. With my il-
legal and insatiable desires, what can I do except take
the desperate chance of not getting caught, and steal
the money I’ve got to have in order to live the way I
feel I must live. We only live once. I’m certainly go-
ing to try to live right, that once; right, that is, for
me, with my perverted notions of living. I know
they’re perverted to 'normal’ people — but they’re
natural to me. Anyway, that’s the way I’m going to
live.”

Unless he follows this line of thought to its logical
conclusion and deliberately goes back to crime as a
method of subsistence, the ex-convict is up against a
further handicap. During the prison years he lived
under the constant government of legally appointed
masters. He was trained to obey blindly — under pain
of punishment by solitary confinement — every com-
mand of a guard, every rule of the prison. He was
encouraged to act only when and as his masters com-
manded him to act, and discouraged from independ-
ent action or even independent thinking. He finds,

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
when he is free, that he is almost incapable of resum-
ing the ways of independent thought and action — so
strong is the habit of wMting for the word of com-
mandy of making no exertion unless specifically
ordered to do so.

Moreover, in whatever community he finds him-
self, the ex-convict is thrown into associations with
men and women whose careers and lives are already
well established and who have no hideous secret which
they must conceal from their neighbors (at least not
so hideous as the secret which the average convict
feels he must scrupulously hide from the world) . The
ex-convict, therefore, feels the need not only of
somehow accounting for the years during which he
was away, but also of erecting a protecting facade of
facts about himself which will help to put him on
equal terms with his new associates. He therefore tells
barefaced lies, or at least by inference leads his neigh-
bors to believe certain facts about himself which are
as ego-bolstering as they are untrue. Aside from the
fact that lying is the natural reaction of the man who
feels himself at a loss, who is conscious of a real or
fancied inferiority, it is the ex-convict’s habitual way
of securing for himself a recognized place in the com-
munity (the place, the security, the reputation he en-
joyed in prison). Many prisoners, like others who
never have tasted prison life, have the natural instincts
of the confidence man, but lack his talents of per-
suasion and savoire faire. This is a dangerous business,
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FREEDOM OF CONVALESCENT
as he soon learns (if he has the faculty of seeing him-
self objectively) . For after a time circumstances in-
variably conspire to destroy the picture of himself
which he has so laboriously built up in the minds of
his associates. This adds to his sense of inferiority and
failure, with the result that he generally hurries ofF to
a new environment — to do the same thing over again.
This need of creating an acceptable picture of himself
in the eyes of neighbors, and the concomitant in-
capability of living up to the spurious fagade he has
erected, drive the ex-convict from one community to
another (or from one problem to another) unless (as
happens very rarely) he has the intelligence to realize
that in this respect one community is almost exactly
hke another, and that he must, in the end, remain in
one place and simply face life honestly. . . .

That, after all, is his problem: to face life honestly.
It is, of course, the problem of every man and woman
in the world. Handicapped as he is at present, how-
ever, it is almost a miracle that any long-term or re-
cidivist prisoner ever achieves rehabilitation. That he
does achieve it, however rarely, is a glorious tribute
to the spirit of man. To start at the bottom is bad
enough; and it is usually considered remarkable when
the man succeeds. It is remarkable! How much more
remarkable, then, is it when the man starts from far
below bottom^ and nevertheless, despite all handicaps,
succeeds! If Society can but view the problem of the
ex-convict in this light, and provide him with re-

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
socializing agencies which will really help him to suc-
ceed, she will not only have helped him, but have
saved herself an unconscionable amount of trouble,
human life, and general economic waste.

270

Chapter XII

The Prisoner Speaks to the Psychiatrist

In the conversations of the men who populate our
prisons there are many pithy sayings. One of them is
heard with remarkable frequency in shop and yard
whenever the conversation turns to the general sub-
ject of psychological tests and psychological examina-
tions. At such times the convict will invariably be
heard to say, "Bug tests are strictly the bunk!”

When, twelve years ago, I first went to prison, I
began to remember what I had heard and read about
convicts, prisons and prison reform. I knew that
Thomas Mott Osborne had spent a week of voluntary
imprisonment in Auburn (New York) Prison. I had
read the book in which he describes what he expe-
rienced and learned during that week. One of the
things he learned was that crime is due, among other
things, to the individual criminal’s maladjustment to
his environment; from which Mr. Osborne concluded
that crime is a problem in abnormal behavior for the
solution of which society should look to the psychia-

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
trist. I knew, too, that leaders in penological thought
considered this idea sound and were trying to reform
American prisons in accordance with it. It seemed to
me that it was an idea which ought to meet with
ready response from the convict, since it offered him
a chance to learn what, as a maladjusted individual,
was wrong with him; and a chance, with the help of
the psychiatrist, to readjust and eventually to re-
habilitate himself. But I heard, to my great surprise
that, for the niost part, my fellow convicts were un-
friendly to the idea that there was anything wrong
with them or that they needed any help from the
psychiatrist. I found that their typical attitude was
very aptly illustrated by the dictum I have already
quoted: "Bug tests are strictly the bunk!”

Upon what, I am asked, is this attitude based?
What lies behind this contempt for and hostility
toward the psychological tests and the psychiatric
examinations? After a great deal of close contact with
every known type of criminal, I believe that I can
answer these questions.

At the very outset, it is well to bear in mind the
fact that the average prison inmate is keenly aware
of some of the ptirposes of these tests and examina-
tions. He knows, for example, that if he fails to make
a good showing in the psychological test he may be
classified as incapable of holding certain desirable in-
tramural jobs. He knows, too, that if the psychiatrist
discovers him to be abnormal in his mental or emo-
tional reactions, or antisocial in his attitude toward
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THE PRISONER SPEAKS
law and order, he may be classified as incapable of so
conducting himself in the free world as to be safely
recommended for parole. He knows, in other words,
that the psychiatrist and the psychologist have the
power (from his point of view) to hurt him. To the
extent, moreover, that he fears somehow that he is
feeble-minded or queer, and believes that the dis-
covery of his true condition will result in his transfer
to a less desirable institution, he concedes to the psy-
chiatrist and the psychologist even greater power to
hurt him. Out of this knowledge arises a fear of the
mental specialists and of the tests themselves.

This is one fact which underlies the average con-
vict’s attitude toward tests and examining specialists.
Another fact, the importance of which is not generally
understood, is that the average convict regards the
psychologist and the psychiatrist as representatives of
law and order. He fears, hates, or is bound by the
underworld code at least to pretend to fear and hate
policemen, prison guards, and other enforcers of the
punishing law and order. He makes no subtle distinc-
tions. The warden, the chaplain, the prison physician,
any one in authority — unless he clearly demonstrates
his friendliness — is the convict’s natural enemy; and
thus he numbers the psychologist and the psychiatrist
among his enemies.

This hostility toward the officials who represent law
and order is based upon reasons which, from the view-
point of the criminal, are entirely logical. As all ex-
perienced criminals know, crime thrives best in social

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
darkness and needs a grina secrecy. Even the younger
and less experienced criminals know that it is danger-
ous to give information about themselves to their
enemies, the enforcers of law and order. Thus it is
that such axioms as "Keep your mouth shut!” and
"Death to informers!” constitute the first and second
commandments of the imderworld code of behavior.
This means that the average criminal deems it not
only weak and foolish, but positively dangerous, to
be honest and truthful in his dealings with any in-
dividual from the ranks of his enemies; and since he
usually considers the psychologist and the psychiatrist
his enemies, he is pretty sure to be dishonest and un-
truthful in his dealings with them. This is a fact
which these examining specialists will do very well
to keep in mind.

There is, finally, the general attitude of the convict
toward plans to reform him. Without going into a
detailed discussion of this attitude, it is perhaps suf-
ficient to say that the convict is, on the whole, indif-
ferent to any plan of prison reform which does not
promise an immediate amelioration of his own present
condition. He is not interested in any far-reaching,
general plan for classifying and segregating criminals
for society’s benefit. To such a plan he is often deeply
hostile and at best lazily indifferent. He is interested
only in plans which promise immediate and personal
benefit to himself; such as better food and entertain-
ment, or a shortening of the length of his imprison-
ment. Since the psychological tests and the psychiatric

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THE PRISONER SPEAKS
examinations not only do not promise him any im-
mediate, personal benefit, but, on the contrary,
threaten to bar him from a soft prison job or a chance
for release on parole, he is not merely suspicious of
them, but actively opposed to them.

The convict is thus seen to have developed an atti-
tude of fear, hatred, active antagonism toward the
tests and the examining specialists. How does this at-
titude affect society’s plan of studying the criminal
in order adequately to cope with the problem he
represents?

By way of answering this question, let me cite
several instances which I know to be typical of the
convict’s reactions to psychological tests and psychi-
atric examinations.

A convict named Warren is called to the guard-
room, where the psychiatrist waits to examine him.
According to the intelligence quotient given to
Warren after the psychological test, he is of higher
mentality than the average convict. The psychiatrist
proceeds with his routine examination, and everything
goes along well enough at the start. A little later on,
however, the psychiatrist encounters difficulties. Hav-
ing decided from certain mannerisms and reactions of
his subject that Warren has a homosexual tendency,
he begins to ask him necessary but very intimate
questions about his sexual life. From this point on,
Warren is extremely reticent. He replies in monosyl-
lables to questions he considers unimportant. Too
angry to answer truthfully, but at the same time

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
afraid thus abruptly to end the examination, Warren
manages to get through the balance of it by down-
right resentful lying when possible, and otherwise by
evasions which, although they may not altogether de-
lude the psychiatrist, certainly do not enable him to
arrive at the truth about Warren’s mental or emo-
tional condition. When Warren comes back to his
shop, after the examination, he reveals to a convict
friend what the trouble was. He says angrily, “Why,

what right has- that of a bug doctor

got to ask me such questions? Does he think I’m a

degenerate? The nerve of him — asking me

if I ever wanted to have sexual intercourse with my
sisters or with my mother! I felt like punching the
in the nose!”

This may seem to the uninitiated an unusual atti-
tude for a convict to assume. Let me say that it is
one of the most typical reactions to the psychiatric
examination that I have nm across during my years
in prison. The average convict, ignorant and unre-
flecting, does not perceive the psychiatrist’s purpose
in asking questions of an intimate personal nature. All
he can rbink of is that people who commit incest are
generally considered moral degenerates, and that the
psychiatrist is (he believes) classifying him as a sexual
pervert. I know of one man, who, on being asked
such a question, jumped up from his chair ready to
assault the psychiatrist, exclaiming, "Why, you dirty
so-and-so, you must be crazy yourself!”

Inmate Smith is the next man to be examined by

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THE PRISONER SPEAKS
the psychiatrist. Smith is an intelligent man. His for-
mal education has been rather limited; but during his
years in prison he has done a great deal of solid, if
haphazard, reading. In wading through popularized
editions of Freiid and Jung, Watson and Jennings, he
has acquired a smattering of current scientific knowl-
edge. Unlike Warren, Smith is very much addicted
to reflection and introspection. As a result of his read-
ing and of a good deal of earnest thought, he has
realized that certain emotional inhibitions to which
he is subject are, perhaps, responsible for the unsocial
conduct which caused him to be sent to prison. Un-
like most convicts. Smith is inclined to be truthful,
honest and sincere. He has come to the conclusion
that, could he but bring himself to talk about his
problems with some congenial friend who also hap-
pened to be a psychiatrist, he might find relief from
the mental and emotional tension under which he has
lived for so many years. Smith goes to the guardroom,
therefore, wholly eager to be truthful, entirely sin-
cere in his wish to be helped, with all the hopefulness
of a pious invalid approaching a sacred shrine. But
what happens after he gets there? First of all, the
psychiatrist’s table is in the very guardroom itself.
Guards and other oflScials come and go within easy
earshot of the table. Other inmates who are receiving
visits look over at Smith from time to time. Some of
them seem to be laughing at him. Others seem to be
admonishing him to watch his step and not give any
information to a prison oflScial. At all events, guards

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
and inmates can see him as he sits there answering the
preliminary questions. They can tell. Smith realizes,
whether he is really bluffing his way through, or
whether he is actually telling the psychiatrist the
truth about himself. Smith, a sensitive, self-conscious
man, loses his courage. Here is not the haven of
refuge that he sought; here is not the privacy of the
confessional, in which he thought to lay bare the se-
crets of his soul. With all his desire to be helped,
therefore, with all his habitual truthfulness and sin-
cerity, Smith finds it utterly impossible, under the
conditions, to thus semi -publicly reveal the (to him)
shameful truth about himself. He does the best he
can; he answers truthfully when that is possible, and
gets through the balance of the examination by eva-
sions and a few unavoidable lies.

This, I admit, is a comparatively rare attitude; but
since it is the attitude of the convict of far better in-
telligence and capacity than the average, I think it
important that the psychiatrist should be made aware
of it, as well as of the fact that lack of privacy often
prevents him from discovering the truth he seeks.

Inmate Jones is the last to be called to the gaurd-
room. In mental stature Jones is distinctly lower than
either Smith or Warren. Although he has not, like
Warren, the vanity to resent questions which he be-
lieves to be personal, and has not, like Smith, the in-
telligence to realize that there is anything wrong with
him, Jones, nevertheless, has a great deal of mental
acuteness and superficial cunning. Jones is, as a mat-
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THE PRISONER SPEAKS
ter of fact, essentially the average criminal, lazy,
ignorant, unreflecting, with few very strong motiva-
tions. Jones has an instinctive craving for the neces-
sities and luxuries of life and the desire to get them
with as little trouble or effort as possible. In prison he
is the same lazy, unreflecting fellow, interested solely
in doing as little work as possible, and in getting out
of prison as quickly as he can. To Jones, as to most
average criminals, the psychiatrist is merely the “bug
doctor”, whom Jones suspects of being more than
slightly cracked himself. The psychiatric examination
is merely another "bug test” (as convicts call the
Binet-Simon, and other tests of intelligence or mental
balance) . It is simply a test which has to be “passed.”
Jones has no doubt of his ability to “pass” the test.
He has seen any number of his friends, many of them
not half as bright as he thinks himself, “pass” it. (To
"pass”, as Jones sees it, is merely to make so good a
showing that he will not be transferred to an institu-
tion for the feeble-minded or insane.) Jones hates the
whole idea of the test, considering it an unseemly and
absurd attempt to prove him feeble-minded or insane.
He also shrinks from the fear that during the test he
may inadvertently give the officials some information
about himself which is not already a matter of record.
Nevertheless, Jones feels that he should submit to the
examination. He is after a job in the storehouse, where
extra food and special clothes may be had, and he is
afraid he will not get the job if the prison officials get
it “in” for him, as they may if he refuses to take the

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
examination. He is aware, too, that a refusal to be ex-
amined may be considered an antisocial tendency in
him, which may prevent his being recommended for
parole. On the whole, therefore, Jones decides that he
had better submit to the test with as great a sem-
blance of truthfulness and cheerfulness as he can put
on. Having decided to do so, he quickly consoles him-
self with the thought that here is a chance to score
off the hated prison authorities, a chance to "get away
with” something. To the outsider who has never
spent hour after weary hour, week after lagging
week, year after endless year in a stuffy prison shop,
this chance for revenge which Jones sees may appear
absurd and trifling. But to Jones, the average crimi-
nal, it is a very worth-while chance — a chance to
steal several hours of comparative idleness from the
prison authorities. So he goes to the guardroom with
a perfectly guileless countenance and proceeds to pull
the psychiatrist’s leg for all he is worth. He is very
calm and unhurried, pauses as if to reflect before an-
swering each question, and gives every appearance of
a man who is honestly trying to remember the details
of his life about which the examiner asks him. He en-
larges on every item from his past life which he can
recall or — better still — invent, and thus manages to
spend an unconscionable amount of time at the psy-
chiatrist’s table in the guardroom — and away from
the hated shop! Eventually, of course, the psychiatrist
sees that his leg has been pulled and dismisses his sub-
ject. But Jones has gained his end! By keeping out of
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THE PRISONER SPEAKS
the shop for several hours, and by wasting the psy-
chiatrist’s time, he has scored off his enemies, the en-
forcers of law and order.

The attitude of Jones is, as I have said, that of the
average criminal. It is the attitude which, if he is
sharp enough to detect it, the psychiatrist will most
often encounter in his examinations of prison in-
mates.

It goes without saying, of course, that in spite of
the evasions, half-truths and deliberate lies of men
like Warren, Smith and Jones, the competent psy-
chiatrist will manage to extract numerous kernels of
truth which may be grist for his particular mill. This,
however, is neither here nor there. The psychiatrist’s
object in examining convicts is to ascertain the truth
about them, so that they may be accurately classified,
and the unreformable criminals segregated from those
who may eventually be transformed into law-abiding
citizens. Moreover, any number of books, magazine
articles, and papers read before the various scientific
societies have been based upon exactly the type of
material obtained through examinations of the War-
rens, the Smiths and the Joneses of American prisons.
Theories of crime and punishment, of abnormal be-
havior, of prison reform, have been all too often based
upon just such worthless material. The point is, that
material obtained through psychiatric examinations is
valuable only to the extent that it contains truth.
After twelve years of close association with other
convicts, some personal experience, and a great deal

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PRISON DAYS AND NIGHTS
of observation and careful reflection, I say to the psy-
chiatrists: Be wary of the use you make of material
obtained during psychiatric examinations of prison
inmates. The material you thus obtain will be com-
posed largely of half-truths, evasions and lies, and will
contain precious little truth. To the extent that you
pay attention to what is said to you by the average
prisoner, you are certain to be hoodwinked.

We are now back where we started from. When
Jones, or the average criminal, says: "Bug tests are
strictly the bunk!” what does he mean? He knows
that he lied to and misled the psychiatrist. He knows
that most of his pals did likewise. He knows, there-
fore, that the psychiatrist cannot possibly know the
truth about him. That is what he means when he says,
“Bug tests are strictly the bunk!”

That is the average convict’s attitude. It is not the
only attitude, of course. There are certain others,
which, like the one I am about to describe, are so rare
as to be negligible, except for the fact that they are
the attitudes of the more intelligent, more reflective
prisoners. As one of them puts it: "The psychiatrists
and psychologists have been coming to us for a dozen
years and more. They have tested and examined us.
They have extracted from us material which they
have used as the bases of lectures, magazine articles,
books, and speeches. They have, in other words, used
us for their own purposes. What I should like to know
is, when are they going to do anything for us?”

It seems to me a fair question. During the past
282

THE PRISONER SPEAKS
twelve years I have served three terms in the prisons
of New York and Massachusetts. The present com-
missioner of correction in Massachusetts is a psychia-
trist; the present commissioner of correction in New
York is, like his predecessor, a psychiatrist. During
these years, nevertheless, I have waited in vain for
help from the psychiatrists. It is true that they have
attempted to classify us, and that in so doing they
have weeded out of the prison population many in-
sane and feeble-minded criminals who belonged in
other institutions. But aside from this, I have never
known of a single case where a convict was given psy-
chiatric treatment for a mental disorder.

When are they going to do anything for us?

END

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